There's Something About December
by SixThings
Summary: Fitzwilliam Darcy is melancholy and misses his married daughter many years gone from the house. Elizabeth entices him to read her a newly published book her sister Mary has brought her during their annual Christmas visit. A novella in five chapters.
1. Stave 1: Collette's Ghost

**Stave 1: Collette's Ghost**

December, 1843

Pemberley Hall was not a Georgian creation but a Jacobean one, it had been added to over the years with wings of newer design and construction but it had first been built in the early 17th century. There was no stately classical entrance hall that welcomed visitors but a huge expansive hall just inside the doors which had been the center of family activity for over two hundred years. Dominating this hall was a fireplace big enough for most men to stand up in though not its current master; if he should choose to get inside, he would need to bend over. In years past, during the darkest and coldest days, that fireplace had always been a warm and welcoming spot in the house.

In recent years, however, while coals littered the bottom of it and if one was walking through the hall one could find a bit of warmth there, those fires were not what they once had been. The fire used to be stoked so that as soon as someone walked in the massive front doors the visitor could feel the heat from the fireplace all the way across the hall. And during the days of the celebration of Christmas there had been great logs blazing inside.

Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy stopped to consider that ancient fireplace and all its associated memories. He supposed it hardly seemed worth it to even light the fire now as there was nobody left at Pemberley. His daughter, Collette, had married and moved away. She was his heir, someday she would, he hoped, come back to Pemberley, but she was elsewhere and occupied with her own family. Collette's husband had stood for a local seat probably five years back now, and so Mr. Darcy's daughter had become a wife of Parliament and spent her time in London when she was not home, her new home in Warwickshire, birthing babies. It hardly seemed worth keeping the fire going in that fireplace, even a small fire.

Darcy could not remember when she had grown. When had that occurred? He supposed such was an issue with other fathers that they too had such revelations, particularly if there was only one daughter in the family. He was still coming to terms with the fact that she was a grown lady, let alone that Collette had married; he often did not consider she was the mother of six children. Darcy still had trouble comprehending the fact that he had _six_ grandchildren—how was it possible that _his Collette_ could possibly have _six children_?

He supposed that he had come to terms with the fact that there were two little granddaughters—they reminded him of Collette and her nearest cousin Sophy (Charles and Jane's oldest)—but that brood of grandsons still eluded him; they were small and noisy and rambunctious and so different from his quiet Collette though he always enjoyed their visits for it meant he got to see his beloved daughter.

A breeze caught him and he turned as one side of him chilled, and he saw Elizabeth come in through those doors, sneaking in as best she could with their old butler, Vernon, holding the door open for her. It had been quite a windy and cloud-covered day though there had been no showers despite incessant rain for a number of days. There was something about cold rain that added to the gloom and depression of the general tenor of these short days, if it had turned to snow it might be cheerier, a soft white world, but it hovered above freezing, and the rain added to Darcy's overall sense of melancholy. His wife greeted him, however, with her usual good humor and with a kiss.

"You are lost in thought again," she said as she stood close beside him.

"I will miss her," he said as he looked at Elizabeth, at all the familiar planes and wrinkles on her face and that one small mole on her cheek. She was still so very beautiful.

"I miss her too," she said. "You are by the old fireplace again, dear," she remarked holding her hands out to warm them. "I worry."

"Where have you been?" he asked.

"I have been to the vicarage, it is my annual visit with Reverend and Mrs. Tupman to discuss parish needs, who is in want, in need," she turned slightly to warm another part of her.

"It is the same every year is it not?" he commented letting out a large breath which turned into a grunt.

"Yes," she said attempting to cheer him, then asked, "what is wrong Fitzwilliam?"

"I don't know," he replied staring at the coals; just a small smattering of them, it was so low he had to reach down because of his height. The hall had been cleared of most furniture for the upcoming St. Stephen's Day celebration. There was no real seating in front of that fireplace. It was also more practical to allow people to gather, standing, in front of it to warm themselves and then to move on to a room where tea would be laid out.

The servants had also cleaned the great hall, scrubbed it in the last day or two for the upcoming Christmas and St. Stephen's Day festivals. Greenery would be hung soon though Darcy considered there was not much for him to these celebrations. They would rise in the morning; he and Elizabeth would go to church and return home for dinner. His daughter would not be there. The next day their neighbors came to Pemberley for that annual open house, again, his daughter would not be there.

"Mary and St. Michael are still coming?" he asked as his wife finished her rotation in front of the fire.

"Of course," she replied.

"And the boys?"

"I understood they were to remain at school," she answered.

"Boys should not have to stay behind at school during Christmas," he grumbled.

"They are seventeen and eighteen," she said, "perhaps they do not wish to return, or perhaps it is too much of a bother to travel?"

"It should not be a bother to see one's family," he grumbled, "though it shall be good to see Mary and St. Michael; they are always welcome." He smiled briefly at her then his face returned to its former dour expression.

"The hall is always quite gloomy, let us go up to the green parlor, Fitzwilliam," and she tugged to get him away from that man-sized fireplace.

Elizabeth's sister Mary had a life which had gotten off to a difficult start. Mary had been the last of the five Bennet sisters to marry and had been greatly pressured to marry by their mother, Mrs. Bennet, because even _badly married_ was better than _not married_ so she had married a clerk in Uncle Philips' office. Mr. Bell had been considerably older than Mary and it had not been the happiest of marriages though she had given birth to a son before heart trouble made her a widow. By that time Mrs. Bennet lay in the church yard, for one of those fits that she so often complained about—and which no one quite took seriously—had taken her away from them unexpectedly. Mary moved back to Longbourn with her father and her infant son for a matter of about three years before Mr. Bennet's old age caught up with him and the property passed from a line of Bennets to a line of Collinses.

But Mary Bell had the good fortune to be loved by many, and she had been taken in by the Gardiners who had an expanded house in London and in a matter of what seemed like months she met and fell in love with a business associate of her uncle's. And where before she had married a man of advanced years, her new husband was younger than she. They produced a couple of sons and were quite happy. They lived, like the Gardiners, in London to be near Mr. St. Michael's warehouses.

Mary's experiences softened her and changed her pedantic outlook on life. She was no longer the moralizing creature that she had once been but a happier one, perhaps if she had not had the fortune to be taken in to live with her father at Longbourn and to have her son have the devoted attentions of Mr. Bennet and then to go live with the Gardiners she might have remained unchanged. But she had the chance to fall in love, truly fall in love, and was no longer the didactic and moralistic creature she once was.

She proved to be of the same mettle as the rest of her sisters and could be a happy one—and living in London meant she had access to books. And access to newly published ones and she shared these with Elizabeth for the English post was a renowned thing, and they both had access to enough pin money to send books and letters back and forth to expand their libraries.

Mr. Wickham had died in a drunken brawl early on. Lydia had ever defended him and had always insisted that he had died defending her honor against some slander. Lydia could never keep coin and always lived in impoverished circumstances moving from one lodging house to another. Her character became hard and caustic, and she took to drink. It was difficult, once there were children in the various sisters' households, to invite her to stay, or in the case of Catherine, who was a parson's wife, to have such a creature—such an example—to be among them, so the sisters sent her money when she was in want.

Lydia did, for a time—when there were still Bennets at Longbourn—stay with her father but Mary set up an objection when she found Lydia slapping her infant son, and Mr. Bennet, who adored his grandson Jacob (who was perhaps that son he wished for but never had), sent Lydia away. The drinking caught up with Lydia and she died at an early age, before she was thirty.

Catherine married a clergyman but had no children. Kitty's husband was one of a large brood of sons, the third of five. The couple often celebrated the season with his family and the sisters did not see her often. Jane and Charles, however, lived in a nearby county and had a large and happy household of children—they visited often until the children grew into adults with lives of their own. Then those lives took precedence and the Darcy saw less of the Bingleys as more and more of them fledged and left the house.

Elizabeth was on his arm as they paced up the stairs to her favorite parlor, the green parlor. Darcy was introspective as he considered the entirety of Christmas. This festival, these celebrations, and he could find nothing pleasing as he pondered the holiday and the various activities associated with it. For him, it was about duty; it was an obligation; it was about Christian charity the way Reverend Tupman considered Christian charity. He was pleased for all the traditions his lovely and beautiful wife had brought to Pemberley. He did not recall what his mother had done during the Christmas season. He thought that they had given a little extra money to the servants at the end of the year and that had been it. But his Elizabeth had established traditions ensuring that there was always a little extra something for everyone of that extremely large staff every year. He still wondered that it took sixty people, inside and out, to run Pemberley.

But he was feeling peevish and that was Christmas for others, servants, and now that Collette was gone and there were no children, no child at home to spoil, no one to bestow gifts on. He was not feeling like Mr. Darcy, master of Pemberley, he was thinking about being just Mr. Darcy, a man, or Darcy to his friends, or Fitzwilliam to his wife, and considering what the season meant to him. He felt like he had lost something. He only found gloom and languor in the darkness because of the shortened days and the coldness because his Collette was gone.

"What are Collette and Engleford to do for Christmas? When do they need to be back in London?" He asked.

"I do not know. Why should I know when Parliament opens again? Is that not the purview of men? Do you not sit around in your smoking rooms or discuss it over your port, and speak of politics," she answered. He held the door open for her as they entered the parlor. "Women discuss things on a smaller scale like the nature of Christian charity, who are the deserving poor and who are the undeserving poor."

"So you do not know where your own daughter is?" he cried.

"There is no pleasing you today, is there Fitzwilliam?" she replied. "My daughter is twenty-eight years old, has been married nine years, and has a home of her own in Warwickshire." She sat on her favorite sofa. "I imagine that since Parliament is currently _not_ in session that she and Engleford and all six of those beautiful little children are at Loddington and that excited little voices and thundering feet may be heard in their own great hall, or up in their nursery."

"I wonder what they do for the festival of Christmas?" he asked.

"I am sure it is similar to what we do," replied Elizabeth.

"Do the children even understand Christmas? Are they old enough?" He took a seat next to her.

"Jane is eight. I am sure she and Agnes have a fine understanding of Christmas. What child does not love to eat sweets and to receive presents?"

"Does Collette give them presents?"

"I am sure she spoils them," answered Elizabeth.

"I wonder what Charles and Jane are doing?" he continued with his questions.

"I am sure it as familiar there as it is at Pemberley," and she poked him. He leaned away from her.

"They have four children still at home," he replied. "Half of their brood have yet to leave and only one is married." He sat back up. "Do you suppose the boys will come home?"

"They are not boys, they are men now. And Vincent lives at Dovedale it is only Thomas and Ernest who have left and have their own lives."

"Vincent is constantly quarrelling with Charles in that manner of first-born sons. I wonder sometimes if some sons do not just wait for their fathers to die so they may have the running of the estates," he grumbled.

"You should be happy you do not have a son."

"I should have liked to have had a son," he said and he moved closer, moving gently to sit rather snugly next to Elizabeth.

"I know you did dear. It was not to be. I lost that child before it could ever have survived and there were no others afterwards despite our efforts. I fear that child's loss undid something and I could not carry any others."

"I know; in no way do I blame you," he moved even closer to her on the sofa. "I simply wonder what life would have been like had we had a son."

"Collette has four sons, surely having four grandsons is sufficient? She is likely to have more," she offered.

"I am not sure my heart can bear it," he said, "every time you travel for one of her confinements, I am sure my heart shall give out," he rested his head on her shoulder.

"What am I to tell her? That she and Engleford should sleep apart?" she leaned her own head in to touch his.

"Exactly right," he sighed reaching out to stroke her hand gently, "tell her, her old father cannot bear to ever consider losing her."

"I should never have suspected that the arrogant and prideful Mr. Darcy of Pemberley should have had such a soft heart," she said reaching up with a hand to stroke the side of his head.

"I can still recall holding her as a baby." He sat up looking away as he recalled his infant daughter. "Sitting with her in that minuscule dog cart where there was no room for my knees but teaching her to drive. Partnering her when she wanted to learn to dance, as I am sure all young girls want to do, and she had no brothers to dance with, and," his wife interrupted him.

"You never would dance with Georgiana, it was a point she often scolded you about."

He looked sheepish but leaned forward to look her in the face as he knew her eye-sight was poor up-close. Like her mother, she had retained sharp eyes when it came to items at a distance, but anything close-up had become a source of conflict, embroidery was difficult—that had not been a loss—but reading she struggled with. Some vanity meant Elizabeth was conflicted about allowing herself to wear eyeglasses so she often read only on the brightest of days, or asked someone to read to her.

"I wish…I regret that I did not dance with Georgiana," he said looking at her when he knew she could not see him clearly though her face still expressed her love and understanding. "I am sure it would have given her happiness and there was never anyone to see or to tell. I was more caught up in propriety, an odd duck in those days, but I hope I have softened since then."

She ran a hand around his middle and patted his belly with the other, a mischievous smile in her eyes.

"I should have read to her as well," and he looked away again, out across the room.

"This appears to be a day for regrets," she said. He was silent for a long time and they sat, comfortable in each other's arms and comfortable with the silence.

"I am deeply sorry that illness took her," he said at last.

"It was an illness that took a number of their parish as well," answered Elizabeth. She, like him, was silent. "Perhaps the season, the cold and the darkness—this incessant rain has worn you down?"

"I am an old man, everything has worn me down," and he smiled slightly and held her tightly. "I fear I am even shorter than I once was."

"You can well afford to lose an inch. But I am considering if we should have gone to London this December? There is something about December that is not agreeing with you."

"We have parish business here, Christmas services, St. Stephen's Day and all of those activities, those festivities, a little New Year's punch with the household staff, and I need to ensure the local lads do not get too rowdy toasting trees on Epiphany," though he sounded more as though he was convincing himself than that it was the correct thing to do.

"Yes, but perhaps a change might be what is needed?" Asked Elizabeth. He did not answer her.

After dinner they sat again and spoke of the coming festivities.

"We are to have the St. Stephen's day feast?" He asked as he sipped his coffee.

"Yes, Pemberley has had it every year for a hundred years at least. We open the great doors to the hall. It will be decked with greenery and half of Derbyshire will, no doubt, come, and we will distribute half the riches of Pemberley to the deserving poor—but only the deserving poor—a point which Reverend Tupman always makes," she looked at him and wrinkled her nose at the taste of the coffee, setting the cup down. "You really need to come sit with me at one of the parish meetings one of these years, dear. Reverend Tupman is most emphatic about the difference between the deserving poor and the undeserving poor. He reminds me a little bit of cousin Collins in his outlook on the nature of Christian charity." She stood to ring for a footman.

"And do you listen to him?"

"Oh I listen to him, and then I have Mrs. Aronson distribute food to whoever requests it and unless he is present—which is never—he is none the wiser," she answered.

"I believe I made a fine choice when I married you and brought you home to be mistress of Pemberley, my dear," he said.

"Thank you, Fitzwilliam. There were times when I worried about all the responsibilities of my role as mistress," she sighed looking at her coffee cup.

"I wonder if Collette shall be up to it?" he made a face as he took another sip of his coffee and he too set his cup down.

She had hoped to distract him from the topic of his daughter, but it was not to be. "She is a grown woman, Fitzwilliam, she will do things her own way. Perhaps she might not live at Pemberley and it may be one of the children who come home to roost here."

"I wonder if she is attached to Pemberley, Elizabeth, did we do right by her?" He asked. "She flew away; she was only nineteen when she married; we had so few years with her." He looked earnestly at her sharing his love and yet his concern and a vulnerability that somewhere, somehow—as a father—he had made an irretrievable and grave mistake with his only child.

"We did a good job with her; she is a lovely woman, and has turned out well, Fitzwilliam. You cannot deny that she has," she answered. Years before she had been aflame and fiery in her responses but years of marriage had tempered her, and Elizabeth knew a calm temperament was best with her husband in such a situation.

"No, she is everything to me," he said.

"And where do I stand in that assessment?" he still could stand to be teased, however.

"You are everything to me as well, you know that my dear," and he kissed her rather passionately for an older man and certainly for a man thirty years married, "ever since that day I realized how enchanting your eyes were, they still bewitch me, each and every single day."

"That is a very pretty sentiment," she said and snuggled closer.

"I really want Collette to come home to roost," he continued desiring not to be distracted from his current complaints. One of the footmen came in then and Elizabeth ordered the bitter coffee taken away and replaced with tea.

"What if one of the girls, Jane or Agnes, or one of the boys come here to roost instead?" she asked when Nelson had departed.

"I barely know those little boys, they are always in London…four days of travel to London used to seem like nothing when I was twenty-five, but are long days when one is fifty-five," he grumbled.

"I believe you are fifty-eight now, my dear," he looked at her with a frown as he did not wish to be reminded of his age.

"Now it seems a very long trip indeed, it is difficult to be stuck in a carriage for so long," he continued.

"Are you going to tell me you have old bones now?" she asked.

"Perhaps, but to travel in the winter I am cold and to travel in the summer I am far too hot," he countered.

"I think you do have old bones; perhaps we should try traveling naked in the summer?" she smiled.

"Elizabeth!" he looked to see if there were any servants about.

"Sometimes I think you are too easily reticent and it has always been my job to shake the apples from the tree," she continued to smile at him. He pulled her to him to hug her before he settled once again beside her.

"When are Mary and St. Michael due to arrive?" He asked at last.

"They should be here by Christmas Eve," she ran a hand across his knee.

"And how long will they stay?"

"They will stay for the whole festival of Christmas," she answered.

"Why is it a festival if we only have a meal on Christmas Day and then we open the doors on St. Stephen's Day and then there is some carousing on Epiphany, mostly by the young men?" He asked.

"I think for others there is more to the holiday, there are mince pies to be eaten everyday between Christmas Day and Epiphany," she said as she continued to stroke his knee. "I think perhaps you eat too well that you do not appreciate having such a treat every day on the twelve days of Christmas." That hand came up to pat his belly again.

"Perhaps I do not," he replied. He leaned over to kiss her again, but Nelson returned, just then, with the tea.

That breezy day, cold and biting, gave way to a succession of rainy days and the occupants of Pemberley moved about a little slower. No one was in a hurry when those December days were dark and gloomy outside, and there was a general languor when the master of the house had a dark and dismal look on his face—it seemed to catch hold of everyone within even down to the boot boy and the youngest kitchen maids.

Elizabeth knew their daughter, nine years married and long gone from the house, came to visit as much as it was possible to visit. But Engleford, her husband, was busy with his constituency and they had six children.

Elizabeth had grown up in a household of five so she knew just what that chaos entailed but Fitzwilliam did not know what such a family life was like. He had largely been an only child until his sister, Georgiana, had been born just as he was turning from child to youth. His relationship with Georgiana had always been more of a father figure than a brother though that had changed once Elizabeth and Fitzwilliam had married, and he had relaxed his reservations—been more affectionate and even playful in his behavior to her with Elizabeth's encouragement. He gained a mature relationship with his sister, and they had grown closer.

Georgiana had been a devoted aunt to Collette who had appeared soon after their marriage, and when Georgiana was still under Pemberley's roof. Fitzwilliam and Elizabeth had seen Georgiana through her come-out, seen her through the heartbreak of admiration and devotion for a gentleman which did not lead to marriage, and finally saw her fall in love with the Reverend Mr. Mason, saw her married and leaving Pemberley behind.

It had surprised everyone, in particular Darcy and Georgiana's aunt, Lady Catherine de Bourgh, that she married a clergyman. To be sure, Reverend Mason came from a wealthy family and had money in his own right. He felt a calling to the church more than he felt a need to be a clergyman. He became so established in the church that he was currently the Archdeacon of Lichfield(1)—some reckoned he may be appointed a bishop soon. It had been a loss to many, especially to Georgiana's son and daughter, to lose their mother to cholera when an outbreak beset their parish when her children were still small.

Elizabeth supposed that Fitzwilliam did not understand the chaos of having six children so young or that Collette could leave them with a governess and assorted nursery maids and come home to Pemberley to visit. Elizabeth could no more have left her single child behind to go visit Longbourn when her daughter was small. Elizabeth had been thankful that Collette and Pemberley had been the one thing that had induced her father to visit. She had been thankful that Bingley and Jane had also purchased an estate nearby that her father, Mr. Bennet, had been able to visit his oldest child as well since he missed both of his daughters and found enjoyment in his grandchildren. It had been sufficient inducement for him to travel when nothing else made Mr. Bennet leave his bookroom.

Fitzwilliam had, perhaps, no understanding of why their daughter visited so infrequently and why it was incumbent on _them_ to visit _her_ though he had decided to no longer visit London (purporting to now dislike the trip) and hence would be missing out on those little girls and boys because that was where they principally spent their time because their father was busy making speeches in the House of Commons.

Elizabeth had enough capacity to love; to love both her husband and her daughter (and love even for her compliment of nieces and nephews). She had the capacity to know and to share and to understand both her daughter's need for her own life—it had been exactly what Elizabeth, herself, had done—but to understand Fitzwilliam's sorrow at missing his daughter and knowing that his framework for family had changed. He had a different point of view about what family meant and that it had changed when Collette had married and left home. It was not what he wanted, her distance, her own little world outside of Pemberley, for Collette to find happiness _elsewhere_ , it was not at all what Darcy wished for.

It was like the difference between being lonely and being alone. Being alone is being comfortable in a room where there are no people and being able to find employment without seeking others; being lonely is finding yourself in a room with no people and not having planned to be there, but desiring company.

Elizabeth, however, had no solution. Collette was not going to come back to live at Pemberley. They lived at Loddington Estate in Warwickshire during the summer months (and when Parliament was not sitting), and in London when it was. And for all that Fitzwilliam greatly desired his daughter to live again at Pemberley again, it was likely that their second oldest boy, Pascal, would come to live at Pemberley for their oldest would have his father's estate. Unless, of course, the oldest daughter, Jane, was to have Pemberley. Pemberley did not exclude daughters from inheriting, and Jane Engleford was Collette's oldest child. Elizabeth supposed it depended on how well she married.

Note:

1) This is an actual position that existed in 1843 though, of course, The Venerable Mr. Mason is fictitious. I had wished to make him a bishop but had trouble identifying a period position that was not so high-up as to be unrealistic.


	2. Stave 2: The 1st Signs of Things to Come

**Stave 2: The First Signs of Things to Come**

The St. Michael's carriage had been spotted and word of its eminent arrival passed on that the master and mistress should be informed. They were down in the great hall by the time their guests arrived. Such visitors were always welcome and it was with exclamations of joy and pleasure that Darcy and Elizabeth greeted and hugged them with the ease, familiarity and affection that the years had given them.

Darcy watched as his silver-haired wife hugged and held her sister to her for a second time, Mary returning the greeting with equal sentiments. Mary's hair was a salt and pepper affair whereas Elizabeth's had turned entirely silver despite there only being a year's difference in their age; he had wondered if it had to do with one favoring Mr. Bennet and the other taking after Mrs. Bennet, but he rather thought the silver hair becoming to his wife that it made her dark eyes even more pronounced and beautiful.

"And the boys are to stay at Winchester?" asked Elizabeth as she pulled back to smile at Mary, "the trip too much to get to London to join you?"

"Perhaps that, though I suspect they have plans in the local town," answered her sister. "They have a number of friends from the surrounding area, and they told me they shall be doing a little visiting."

"More like a little mischief," said St. Michael. Mary's husband was four years her junior and had kept his youthful looks with only a smattering of gray appearing in his hair. He could pass for a much younger man—a point he sometimes thought was to his disadvantage as a man in trade wanted to appear well-established, and St. Michael had often, in his early years, not been seen as reliable because he had been seen as too youthful.

"They are young and foolish?" Darcy had to ask as if he had never been foolish and as if he could not ever recall being a young man.

"Young pups who do not know their mind," said St. Michael, "but best to let them make their mistakes now before they go to Cambridge. I should hate to have them sent down from there." That youthful face gave way to a concerned father's one.

"It is difficult to know, sometimes, how much rein to give and when to pull back," said Mary. "With Jacob, I believe, I was lucky. He did not often try my patience, or John's either."

"Jacob is well?" asked his aunt.

"Yes," Mary smiled, her eyes alight, "and he has missed a number of our Sunday suppers in the past two months."

"Oh really? A young lady!" guessed his Aunt Elizabeth without having any other information.

"I believe so," answered Mary. "He has claimed business as his excuse for missing supper, but his bachelor quarters cannot be as good at providing him meals as those which are procured at our house."

The sisters had been moving up the stairs to the green parlor with their husbands following in their wake. "Lizzy!" cried Mary, "I have a new book for you, it is the most delightful little thing I have read in quite a while," she stopped to peer at her sister and gather a hand in hers before continuing their march up.

"I always look forward to your selections, dearest," said Elizabeth.

"It is short, not really even a novel. I found it just as we were leaving London. It has just been published so I purchased it and read it on the trip here. Really, the most _delightful_ thing I have read in years!"

" _That_ is quite the recommendation," said Elizabeth.

"I even read it a second time, since we were so many days on the road," exclaimed Mary, "let met fetch it from my luggage."

Darcy watched his sister and his wife as they hurried up the stairs and turned to his brother. "That was faster than last year. Care for a brandy to restore your spirits? Mine have been lower than usual and I wonder if you are not missing John and Joseph more than you let on?"

"Yes, exactly so," replied John St. Michael and the two men headed for the study with its worn furniture, a cheerful fire, the brandy and fine company to entertain them through the afternoon.

They did not meet again for a proper tea, there was so much visiting to do, but it was Christmas Eve and there were activities to see to—even if that cadre of Pemberley servants carried out the majority of the work. For on Christmas Eve the hanging of the greens was to be accomplished and boughs of holly, ivy, hawthorn, rosemary, and Christmas rose were hung around Pemberley Hall though especially in the great hall.

Mistletoe was hung in various places about that great hall in anticipation of the crowds of people who would be there for the St. Stephen's Day celebration. It could not help but tempt the servants as they bustled about their business, and Elizabeth and Mary stood in front of the fire, which the mistress of Pemberley had asked to be stoked with logs and not coal, and watched the footmen and housemaids enjoying their task of decorating the hall and of stealing kisses. Mrs. Darcy ordered warm cider to be sent up from the kitchens that they could toast each other once their work was completed and wish each other the best of the season.

Supper among the four adults was a companionable meal as there was a lot of family news to catch up on. News can be shared in letters but only so much could be fitted onto a sheet of paper. And Great-Aunt Mary had yet to see her niece Collette's newest son and her niece Sophy's newest daughter had been spied only once. Elizabeth had to describe both in glowing terms, and Mary listened with affectionate smiles and thoughts of her own grandchildren-to-be.

The three grown Bingley sons were discussed. The oldest and heir, Vincent, had been so unlike either of his affectionate and agreeable parents that many considered him a changeling child switched at birth. He had often given Mr. and Mrs. Bingley trouble over the years though now that he was in his late twenties Vincent finally appeared to be settling down. His Uncle Darcy had taken him in-hand a number of times to straighten him out when his easy-going father seemed at a loss as to what to do with a rebellious son. The Bingley's other two grown sons took after their parents more, and Captain Bingley and the Reverend Bingley both had established themselves well enough.

There was sympathy for Jane to be launching one more daughter, Julia, who had just turned eighteen, as there were two others still at home. It might be a more than usually difficult proposition for the mother as that trio of daughters were quite devoted to each other and the two aunts often joked that the three Bingley sisters, who were as close in age as Jane, Elizabeth and Mary had been, would, perhaps, need to marry a trio of brothers.

There was one last son, a sort of surprise child, Daniel, who appeared to be like the oldest son in temperament and was already showing signs of being rebellious at thirteen and causing no end of difficulties for his parents when Jane and Charles were more interested in enjoying their growing troop of grandchildren and relaxing into their golden years.

The four of them rose on Christmas morning and attended church—the weather was warmer than it had been though it appeared it might rain a little. Darcy considered, about three or four minutes into the sermon, that it was the exact same sermon that Reverend Tupman had given probably five years back. Darcy suspected that the man filed his sermons away, once composed, to save himself the bother of having to write new ones.

He supposed it was not such a bad idea except _this sermon_ was a rather heavy-handed one; Darcy recalled the conversation from two weeks before when he and Elizabeth had stood before the great hall fire. She had mentioned that the vicar had strong ideas about the nature of Christian charity and those ideas were coming through now as the vicar delineated who should receive such charity and who should not.

Reverend Tupman appeared to be one of those people who felt that where you were in life reflected how God viewed you and that to help anyone up out of a bad situation was to be going against God. So any charity beyond a penny or two to the poor was a blasphemy. An apple was acceptable, a meal was too much.

Darcy frowned and brooded the more he listened. The vicar was a powerful figure and was one to set the standards of morality and charity in the area, but Darcy as the local land owner, held considerable sway as well—and held the living that the good Reverend Tupman occupied. He thought he would make a call to the reverend and discuss the nature of Christian charity for their little corner of Derbyshire some day in the future.

Darcy looked over at his wife and noticed that Elizabeth and Mary sat holding hands and he wondered if it was conspiratorially, in some fashion against the message that was being delivered, or if simply in love and charity because they had not seen each other since the summer. Was it some harkening back to the days of their childhood and had they, forty years back when they were small, held hands in church to survive tedious sermons? He had no sibling when he was ten with whom to hold hands. Darcy and his one sibling, Georgiana, were more than ten years apart. She would have been an infant.

A sadness washed over him again as he considered his sister who had passed away at a far too young age. Illness and death were grim realities of life and their families had been lucky in many respects though Mary had been widowed when she was twenty-seven; he had understood Jane to have miscarried a few babies. Elizabeth had lost the one child so late it been well-formed and there had been no other children for them after that. And then there was the great tragedy of his sister's death. Georgiana Mason had only been but twenty-nine when she had contracted cholera during an outbreak in their town; being the reverend's wife she had dutifully been visiting the sick and bringing needed food and charity to others who had been affected.

Darcy sat on his pew starting at Reverend Tupman and considered how he felt about charity and where did it end if it left behind a grieving five year old boy and a distraught three year old girl in so doing. He glanced again at his wife and her sister and wondered if they would do the same, to their detriment, but to some poor person's benefit? When did the nature of Christian charity go too far?

Their Christmas feast was excessive and he considered the dishes before him in light of his thoughts in church as he considered the roast beef and the deliciously brown and crackling goose skin that tempted him. The skin had been his boyhood favorite and when he was young had always been denied him so he always claimed it as his own now that he was master. The platters and bowls were spilling over with turnips and sprouts and so many other good things to eat and Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy of Pemberley's thoughts swung a different way again.

He thought about Elizabeth's remark that even in his own household, with his multitude of servants, the Christmas season was a special time where those servants looked forward to their mince pies each of the days of Christmas—that extra treat was still very much appreciated. How many others within his sphere of influence had even less and should he work harder to reach them—those undeserving poor that Reverend Tupman had railed against that morning—and despite such a terrible outcome as had taken Georgiana?

Family and family concerns dominated the discussion at Christmas dinner and Darcy listened more than he participated as Elizabeth discussed their grandchildren and the prospects for Julia Bingley's come-out in the spring—and the remaining two older Bingley daughter's prospects. Mary St. Michael countered with discussions of John and Joseph's schoolwork—and the sort of pranks that distracted them from that schoolwork (they were lively boys)—along with some talk about her oldest son Jacob's potential interest in a mysterious young lady. St. Michael happily joined in when it came to discussing his two sons though Jacob was the product of Mary's first marriage. Jacob had been six when St. Michael had taken him under his roof and had become a good step-father, luckily not one of those painted so horrifically in the books shared by Mary and Elizabeth.

Jacob Bell had been left money by his father and had established himself in trade in London working principally with imports from India. His business was doing well and he employed a number of clerks, his warehouses were always full, and he had been, according to his proud mother, considering the purchase of a house and moving from his bachelor's quarters. But there was this Miss Dennis—mentioned by him only once—and these broken dinner engagements which carried them through the meal all the way to the march pane, gingerbread and the Christmas pudding brought in by the footmen for dessert.

Darcy liked the plum pudding the best though it was so rich and he had eaten a great deal already. He looked at the beautiful dish of march pane (2) though and his mind flew back to his sister—that had been Georgiana's favorite dessert. The Pemberley cook, Mrs. Goodluck, had crafted a beautiful creation with a fluted edge and frosted background topped with gilded hearts which she had shaped together to look like a giant flower and with giant red circles framing the center and the outside. Gloom crept through his limbs and settled in his mind and his heart as he considered her fate. He wondered what her children would be doing this Christmas day: her son, his namesake, Fitzwilliam Mason, living as a gentleman he had heard, and her daughter, Maria, who had not yet married though was of age.

They had no need of giving gifts to one another as Elizabeth and Mary had been so frequent with their presents to each other through the year, especially of books. There were no children to spoil, no grandchildren to pamper with sweet treats and gifts, despite disapproving looks from the parents. It was only Elizabeth and Mary and Darcy and St. Michael.

There were the gifts, however, that were to be given to the staff; and with Pemberley the size that it was, it meant there was a large number of gifts to hand over and the process took the better part of the afternoon. Elizabeth had recently done-over a parlor all in shades of green which had become a particular room of hers and she often hide away there. It was even greener with Christmas boughs hung about as they settled onto sofas or chairs to await the first round of servants to come in to receive their gifts.

The outside servants came first, then the below-stairs, then the above-stairs servants until finally the senior staff came to toast the day and the season with the master and mistress. All as had been traditional and as had been done for the thirty years since Elizabeth Darcy had been at Pemberley. She prided herself in hand-selecting each gift though sometimes purchasing a _particular_ gift for each of the maids or footmen was a difficult proposition so she worked at, as this year, selecting the prettiest fabric, for example, for each housemaid with each girl's coloring in mind or engraving a watch for the footmen.

The twenty outside staff came in and the four of them, Master and Mrs. Darcy and Mr. and Mrs. St. Michael, wished the grooms and the gardeners all well, passing out the small gifts and envelopes with a little extra coin to them. Elizabeth did have one extra gift for the boot boy, Jack Cobb, who was learning to read—a book Poor Jack(3)—which Mary had brought at Elizabeth's request. Darcy did his best to nod and be thankful but stared down at boots or up at forelocks with a mostly forced smile.

That complement of under maids came in, led by the cook, Mrs. Goodluck. There was still one nursery-maid on staff, Simpleton Crisp, who had raised Collette and had nowhere else to go so, out of charity, was kept on. These poor maids often sported red and chapped hands as they washed clothes, dishes, milked cows, or cooked food all day. Darcy looked at the shy lot of them, so unused to being above stairs, let alone in front of both him and Elizabeth, and he affected to smile though one of the dairy maids leaned back a little and he wondered if he only looked intimidating. Once upon a time he used to be a handsome man but he supposed now that he was past fifty he was simply old, aged, and alarming, and he narrowed his eyes and went back to brooding as Elizabeth and Mary distributed the gifts.

The housemaids and footmen entered and he was brought up short by how very young these servants were—younger even than his daughter. Some of the maids seemed but little girls in his eyes, the footmen gangly youth. Elizabeth had mentioned late last night how there had been some kissing under the mistletoe in the great hall as these youths and maids had decorated it with greenery, but he thought them too young for such a thing. But had not Elizabeth been but twenty when he had first met her? Collette but nineteen when she married. Were not most of these—children—of that age? How did he get to be so old? When had life passed him by that his servants were kissing under the mistletoe in his great hall and he was fussing and fuming about his advancing years, about those years which had slipped by him and considering how rapidly life had flown by.

He listened while Elizabeth passed out cloth—fussing a little over each maid—she obviously knew the housemaids better than the others since she saw them on a daily basis. When she went to distribute presents to the footmen she started first with a stern look on her face and, in particular, eyed one footman, Elliot. She had pocket watches for them this year and a number had wide smiles at the fanciness of the present.

When they left and they were waiting for the last set of servants to arrive Darcy asked her why she was so stern with the footmen.

"It is not about all of them, just Elliot," she replied. "He cannot keep coin in his pocket and that watch will be sold tomorrow, I fear. But I cannot hold back giving him a gift when I give the others one, can I?" she asked.

"I wonder that we keep employing him?" Darcy bristled.

"He is young still; I keep hoping he will learn," she explained. "I think that being a footman is the best bet for him as then he has a bed to sleep in and food in his belly. He has spoken of enlisting but I fear being an in the army is not what he imagines. So I keep him on staff," answered his wife.

"I think we should not be throwing money away on a gift that shall be turned into gin," said Darcy and he quickly rose and left the room.

Elizabeth stared at the door as if she had not considered that an old man could move so quickly. She certainly had not realized the extent of his current unhappiness with the season. She turned to look at her brother, "St. Michael, could you see to him?"

"Of course, Elizabeth," and St. Michael rose and followed Darcy out.

The steward, housekeeper, butler, valet, and lady's maid arrived, and she made apologies for their master's absence before giving out the last of her gifts. She and Mary then stood as Vernon brought them glasses of sherry and they toasted the season together.

Darcy's mood was not improved once he reappeared but the meals and the day meant his fellow creatures ignored the gloom emanating from him and continued on with their small celebrations—having wine rather than coffee after supper—and then declaring they were all quite tired and retiring at a far earlier hour than was usual to bed.

He stood in the threshold of the dressing room not wanting to go on. Darcy knew his state of mind had not improved since hearing about his footman who had no hand with money but that mood had actually been despondent since he had considered that beautiful march pane dessert.

He had recalled his beautiful sister, Georgiana, and a burst of memories had hit him, and it had pained him. He had not known that Christmas could be wounding but those memories of his sister had been powerful and yet he realized he had not done much to see his nephew and niece these past years since they had reached the age of adulthood. Maria had a come-out—though not the fancy London affair Collette had received—three or four years back now. Maria must be one and twenty now, at least. Those celebrations had been the last time Darcy had seen his sister's daughter and he could not account for _why_ they had not visited more often. It was not that the Reverend Mason was so pompous and moralizing in character like Elizabeth's old cousin Collins that one never wished to speak to him.

"I can see you, despite the coals having been banked in the grate," said his wife from their bed. "I wonder what makes you stand in a doorway so long like a cat that has convinced the cook to open the door but now is not sure he wishes to leave."

Darcy leaned against the doorframe, "I am unsure about this holiday. Its meaning seems to elude me. It is for others, for a mistress to give gifts to her servants, for a master to open his house to the poor, but not for a man, just a man, to enjoy," he said.

"Those are very noble things for us to do, Fitzwilliam," said Elizabeth.

"But is there no meaning for me as a simple man? I am shamed and you have to send my brother to retrieve me because I resent one drunken footman and missed drinking to the season with the rest of the staff," the bitterness in his voice was evident.

"I have not said anything about your leaving," she said.

"I cannot help but consider that the servants are speaking of it," he grumbled.

"No doubt they are, but you have reined at Pemberley for almost forty years. One missed toast is nothing to worry about," soothed Elizabeth.

He left his post and finally walked into the room. "I did not go demand Elliot return the watch. I ended up wandering the halls and considering the holiday."

"That is a good thing; once given it is his to do with as he pleases," she said as she pulled the covers back to accommodate him. "He is more inclined to hats, not gin."

He stopped as he was about to crawl into bed to look at her. "Pardon?"

"I believe Elliot the footman fancies himself an admirable figure with the young maids and likes to dress well. Even girls of that age know enough not to choose a peacock if he cannot pay for a drink when he is trying to impress them. Like I said, he is young; and I pray he will learn."

The cold was creeping up his toes so he finished crawling into bed.

The visitors to Pemberley Hall were lined up outside even before the great hall doors were thrown open to welcome them in. The servants had bustled about readying any last minute preparations and ensuring that any boughs of greenery that might have slipped or seemed to be out of place were hung just so and the footmen, with the help of the gardener's boys, had hauled in the great fallen logs which were to be burned there leaping and dancing with flames and mesmerizing to anyone who would stare at them in that giant fireplace which was the center feature of the room. The master and mistress and their guests rose early and were waiting in front of it for all of the St. Stephen's Day guests.

The doors were thrown open and all of the surrounding neighborhood and county came pouring into the great hall. There were those seeking relief as had been the custom and these folks had lined up early to receive baskets stuffed with food, a bit of cloth, and a small pouch of money hidden inside.

It had also been a tradition for the landowner to receive tithes from his tenants though this had transformed into a more symbolic ceremony as it was not that the Pemberley tenants came and brought the master ten percent of their annual goods as had probably been done hundreds of years ago. Tenants now paid cash rent to Pemberley's steward but those tenants paid him symbolic homage of a tithe of the best of their crops or their products and spoke of what was good and what was bad about the year. It had been quite a mild year, weather-wise, which meant that crops had been good and people, most everyone in the hall, was in a good mood—except for the master whose mood from the previous day had not entirely dissipated.

Darcy saw cheer and good humor and festivities happening all around him and yet he seemed to feel none of it as he looked around. But at the same time he felt compelled to seek out and to observe the goings-on around him. A vat of punch hung over the fire which Mrs. Goodluck ensured was well-spiced and cups handed to whoever asked. Mrs. Aronson and her maids distributed the baskets of plenty. Some neighbors came simply to meet up and to converse. The mistletoe hung in far greater quantities than he thought necessary and it was well used. There seemed to be an excess of kissing going on—particularly out of the corner of his eye though whenever he turned his head the participants had grinning faces, blushing cheeks and would stand looking at one another smiling, sometimes with shy looks, or even one time he saw a youth run away in embarrassment.

But if a group appeared particularly festive and he sought them out he noticed that the tenor of the trio or quartet changed once he joined it. It seemed that even if he plastered a smile on his face, people knew it was a false smile—his mood preceded him—turning others' merriment into merely polite conversation. He was affecting the happiness of the day but as he was master of Pemberley he felt could not leave. Darcy began to feel at odds with himself, with his role as master and his simply being a father and uncle missing his distant family. He felt his old bones aching as he walked about wishing for a chair.

St. Michael brought him some mulled wine as Darcy stood again by that massive fireplace, probably with a frown on his face, looking out at his tenants and neighbors with their festive good cheer.

"You look as if the day has wearied you," said his brother.

"I believe it has," Darcy replied.

"Are you called upon to spend the whole day overseeing all the events that need to occur here? They appear to happen without needing direction from the master of Pemberley," suggested St. Michael.

"Perhaps we might retire for a bit," Darcy brightened at that idea. It was as if being given the permission was what he needed and by his angel rescuer once again. He had argued with Elizabeth last night about her sending St. Michael after him when he had left to seek out the miscreant footman, Elliot. But today the angel St. Michael was a welcome relief.

"Perhaps we need something stronger than mulled wine?" suggested Darcy.

"Perhaps we do," said St. Michael. And they left the great hall for his worn and cozy study.

Notes

2) March pane is an almond paste dessert similar to marzipan. It is often made with ground almonds, sugar and rose water.

3) Poor Jack is a period novel by Frederick Marryat and published in 1840. Jack begins life as a mudlark but works his way to being a sailor. He eventually retires a rich man.


	3. Stave 3: The 2nd Sign of Wonderful

**Stave 3: The Second Sign of Wonderful**

Darcy was moving around their apartments restlessly and spied a book on a table. It stuck out as it had the appearance of being new and not well-worn and well-read, besides which it was quite thin and not large—not even if it was the first volume of many, of an even larger work. His sister Mary must have brought it for Elizabeth, and he wondered if it was the book which Mary had spoken about, which had so captivated his sister on her trip north.

He opened it up to find its pages had been cut and it already had the appearance of having been read despite a publication date of that year. Darcy's eyes glanced at the opening chapter.

' _Marley was dead to begin with. There was no doubt whatever about that.'_

He closed it and wondered what his wife had taken to reading; she was not one for the gruesome sorts of stories and it did not sound like an appealing story at all.

A few days after Christmas and the festival of St. Stephen's they had an unexpected visitor. No one would suppose the mother of four children to brave such a carriage ride—a distance of ten miles—to come from her own home to visit Pemberley. But Sophy Thomas nee Bingley, Jane and Charles' first born, came to call. She came knowing that her Aunt Mary was in residence; she came because she loved both her aunts, and she came because she had made the trip many times before from her own family home when she was a child.

Was there another reason to it? Was her own household dull, was the level of activity of three little girls and an infant too much that a carriage ride was an inducement for Mrs. Thomas to get those children out of the house and have them nap in the carriage on the way to Pemberley? They came to visit that day—there was actually some sun peeking through the clouds, which might be reason enough, though that often meant it was cooler than those cloudier days that had come before but still decent and mild—and no rain.

Sophy took after her father both in looks and by nature and was a gregarious and agreeable young mother of four girls. The youngest had been born in the spring that baby whose pretty little face her Aunt Mary had only peered at once. Mrs. Thomas was all apologies when she first arrived saying she knew it was bad manners to visit with young children and that visiting was really something done only between adults. One was not supposed to show up with a child, let alone four children, but they were all family and it had been ever so long since they had all been together.

Her Aunt Elizabeth and her Aunt Mary assured her of their delight with her visit and insisted that she stay all afternoon as they played with the little girls and negotiated over who got to hold baby Florence. Even Uncle John enjoyed the visit. He could be a fun playmate, being a gruff old bear, growling at Martha, Alexandra, and even petite Catherine, and chasing them around the furniture. They would squeal with delight and run away. He would go to sit down again and then they would come to stand before him and taunt him and tease him. He would take a sip of cold tea, put his cup down and growl at them, stand and they would run away and he would chase after them once more. He had been a good father playing with his sons and had just as much delight playing with his niece's children.

The three little happy girls running around his drawing room made Darcy happy that day, and he delighted in watching St. Michael being foolish and pretending to be a bear or an ogre as he chased them in an unending game for which neither the girls nor his brother seemed ever to grow tired. For once, Darcy did not feel melancholy as he watched his nieces' happy faces as they ran around, and as he watched Elizabeth holding a sleeping baby. There seemed almost no need for Sophy to have brought her own nursemaid though they had asked their own Miss Crisp to ready the nursery in case it was needed. Darcy was enjoying himself, enjoying his happy afternoon when the butler entered.

Vernon was an unexpected sight and very properly announced, "Master Daniel Bingley to see you, sir."

"Daniel!" cried Darcy looking at his butler.

"Daniel is here!" cried Sophy who looked incredulously at the butler and wondered why her brother should be at Pemberley. "I wonder if Mamma and Papa have come to visit?" She looked at the butler. "Are Mr. and Mrs. Bingley here as well?" she asked.

"No ma'am, it is only Master Daniel who has come to call," he answered.

"Show him up," said Darcy.

"He came home from school after the term," said Sophy, "Papa insisted, thought he should be home for Christmas," explained Sophy. "I wonder if Vincent did not ride over with him in the carriage," she continued, still speculating on how and why her thirteen year old brother should be presenting himself at Pemberley.

Their home, her former home and Daniel's current home, which was called Dovedale, and lay a little over twenty miles away, was not such an easy visit as was a journey from her home: Faintree.

Into the drawing room walked pride. Daniel Bingley was so pleased with himself that it could be read in his countenance, on the mud on his boots, in the set of his shoulders, in the grin on his face. He was proud of himself; he had a tale to tell, and he was ready to share as soon as he strode across the room to greet his aunts and his uncles, to nod at his sister, and to have three little girls squealing over him.

"Daniel! What have you done?" cried his sister.

Sophy was seventeen years his senior, the oldest in the family, Daniel the youngest of eight children. She was almost old enough to be his mother, had fussed over him when he was small and had left the house almost before he had memory. He was brooking no mothering from her today.

"Aunt Elizabeth, Aunt Mary, you are both looking well! How has the season been?" he said without answering his sister.

"It is very pleasant to see you, Daniel," said his Aunt Elizabeth.

Mary replied, "I missed you this summer when I came to visit. You were but a scarp of a thing last Christmas; you have grown a bit."

Youths hate to be told of their relative height and the breadth or lack thereof, of their shoulders, and he glared at her for the remark. But the four adults sat waiting for the story of how he happened to be at Pemberley, his sister, however, could not wait.

"Truly, Daniel, do Mamma and Papa know you have come?" cried Sophy Thomas, formerly Sophy Bingley, but still a concerned sister.

"I told them I was going out riding after breakfast," he replied.

"But did you tell them _where_?" she pressed.

"No, it just came to me, to come. It has been rather boring at home. Vincent has been awful. The triplets have been intolerable so I simply decided to come. It has been a grand adventure!"

"So you rode this whole way without telling Mamma? The poor dear, she will worry herself to death!" She was thinking both as the daughter of Jane Bingley and as a mother herself.

"Papa will think it a grand adventure when he finds out, I am sure," replied her brother.

"We shall have to send word to Dovedale," said his Uncle Darcy. "It is too late for you to ride home. Twenty miles is too far to go at this hour of the day in winter. It shall be dark soon enough. Even your sister shall need to rush off in order to make it home to Faintree though she is most welcome to stay as well."

Three little Thomases pleaded with their mother to be able to stay because Uncle John was such a fine fellow and their Uncle Daniel was here as well, but their mother had them say their goodbyes and bestow hugs and kisses on their aunties, and hustled them and her nurserymaid off in order to beat the encroaching darkness.

Darcy wondered, as he came through the dressing room door, why he was always the second one to come to bed as he spied Elizabeth turning the pages of a book. He knew her eyesight was too poor to read by the light of a single candle and, besides, she was turning the pages too quickly to be reading.

"What are you about?" he asked as he crawled in bed beside her.

"I am looking at the illustrations in this book," she answered. She moved closer to him and showed him a picture of a man with some sort of strong box at his feet who stood hovering over a woman who appeared to be seated at a curb. Behind the man there were faint figures with tormented faces, behind those still more faint, gossamer figures, see-through, all hovering near or above that woman in black.

"It is a very grim picture," he said as he looked at the title inscribed at the top of the page, ' _Marley's Ghost_.' "Is that the book Mary brought you?"

"Yes, she was quite right, it is the most delightful and wonderful thing I have read in years," answered Elizabeth. "I keep hoping to have time to read it a second time, but we have become suddenly busy with so many visitors that I have not found time during the day to read."

"It does not look at all appealing," answered Darcy with a yawn. She closed up the book but handed it to him.

"Have a look at it," she said.

"I did peek at it once already," he said taking it from her. He dutifully opened it, however. He flipped through to another page where he found an illustration of an odd little man who appeared to be glowing. He had a nightcap on his head. The caption on this page read ' _The First of the Three Spirits_.'

"I am not sure this is the sort of book which would appeal to me," he said. Darcy turned the pages to look at the title page of the book. There, at least, was a happy picture of a fat couple dancing. 'A Ghost Story of Christmas,' said the title in black letters across the middle of the page and he frowned. "Ghosts?" he asked pointing to the words.

"A Christmas Carol," she said pointing to the beginning of the title at the top of the page written in red ink, "in Prose," she ran her fingers over the words as she read. They were in large enough type that she could read them. "A Ghost Story of Christmas, by Charles Dickens(3)," she finished.

"You have enjoyed it so much you wish to read it a second time?" he asked.

"Yes," she answered. "Perhaps, since it is so dark, you might read it to me?" She snuggled closer. "Simply a chapter each evening? My eyes, you know, are not what they once were."

"It has been a long evening, might we begin tomorrow night, my dear?" he asked.

"That would be acceptable," she answered, snuggling, if possible, even closer.

A carriage was heard while they were still all at breakfast the next morning and surprised looks were traded around the table, and a few frowns, and some interested glances, at young Daniel as to how the Bingley carriage could possibly arrive so early in the day. Elizabeth worried that Jane had been so beside herself that once she received the notice about her errant son Jane had set off from Dovedale for Pemberley despite its being the middle of the night. Mary had similar thoughts as she looked at the youngest of her nephews though he seemed not at all perturbed by the concerns and glances passed around the table.

Mary was, herself, perturbed when her two sons were escorted in to join them at that table.

Daniel was the first to jump up and greet his cousins while his parents took their sons' appearance in with shocked expressions, and his aunt and uncle took them in with perhaps the same incredulous expression with which they had taken in Daniel's appearance the day before. They quickly processed the sort of events that would have led to two boys, on the brink of manhood, granted (and who were purported to be in the south of England enjoying an end of term feast and assorted festivities), to show up at Pemberley.

The brothers were less self-satisfied about their appearance at Pemberley than their cousin had been the day before, but threw out various reasons for their coming. One point they both agreed upon was that their Christmas feast that year had been nothing like what they experienced at home.

Any parent is pleased to see her child after months of separation so Mary could not help but be joyful at seeing John and Joseph though wondering at how they had achieved the trip to Pemberley, having just survived it herself. She knew Winchester had to be even farther than London and wondered at them being able to make the trip in what appeared to be miraculous time.

The brothers, after supplying themselves with plates overflowing with food (and Aunt Elizabeth ordering more brought from the kitchen), explained away their journey easily enough. They had survived a trip on the mail coach with its unending movement, and its cramped quarters, stopping neither to sleep, barely to eat, all the way to Derby. There they pooled their money to hire, at great expense, a cart to take them out to Pemberley.

The brothers looked ready to sleep but would not admit to it but at least would accept the suggestion of a bath and then the cousins happily found amusement at Pemberley while the adults discussed the folly and the energy of being young.

The Bingleys arrived in the middle part of the afternoon. Elizabeth had Mrs. Aronson set up rooms for them in anticipation of their staying as once they came it was likely that they would stay for a day or two, what with Mary visiting, and the unexpected arrival of John and Joseph.

Jane had been worried about her youngest son. Her experiences with her oldest had been a trial, and though there had been some relief with her two others, Daniel appeared as though he wished to make his mark in the Bingley family and out-do his oldest brother, with the foolish behavior, the bad choices, in the ways that he could try the patience of his mother, and he seemed on his way to be doing just that.

Jane was, however, an older and experienced mother and while she worried, part of her had, at least, considered that whatever he, Daniel Jonathan Bingley, had disappeared to do that previous day, it was most likely aimed at trying her patience. That did not stop her from scolding him unmercifully and suggesting to Charles that Daniel lose his allowance for the next term at school which led to a family argument which the aunts and uncles gently walked away from until concluded.

The Miss Bingleys came with their parents. Daniel often referred to them as the 'triplets' though they were not triplets but simply close in age. The young ladies sat with their aunts for tea and talked about Julia's going to London and Minnie and Edith's return in the spring. They discussed girlish things and all of the small activities that made up their world. When their mother came to join them it was difficult not to compare the three daughters with those three sisters and to recall a time, thirty years before, when the aunts were young.

There were differences, it was Julia who was the family beauty—the youngest Bingley daughter had inherited her looks from her mother. She received the title of 'family beauty' as her mother had replaced _her_ mother before her. Minnie was, perhaps, bookish, and on the plain side like her Aunt Mary for whom she was named. Edith had a mind of her own and was spirited like her Aunt Elizabeth.

Dinner was a grand affair when your numbers have stretched from four to twelve and Darcy could not recall such a delightful evening. There was nowhere to go, nothing to do but to sit and converse and everyone was pleased with each other's company. Mrs. Goodluck had a soft spot in her heart for visiting youths and young ladies and created dishes and desserts to tempt them all. And they lingered, course after course, and talked far into the night about family stories, grandparents, distant relatives, old family estates, old friends and new, and cousins and grandchildren and new babies.

He had delighted in his company the whole day. To have long discussions with Charles about serious subjects—politics and crops—and to also simply take tea with all the children and hear what _they_ had to say about the state of the world had given him such pleasure that Darcy had not a moment during the entire day to consider his former gloom, to recall how much he missed his own daughter or lament her growing up or to wonder about his sister's children.

He dutifully opened the book Elizabeth passed him—she had brought a candelabra with two tall candles lit to illuminate the page, but Darcy was tired, admitted he felt old, and staring at that first page he had no cheer or thrill at such a story that the first chapter or 'stave,' as this Dickens fellow called it, was entitled ' _Marley's Ghost_.' He had no patience or interest in stories about ghosts.

"You hesitate," she said. Thirty years of marriage meant he recognized that voice; he had no option but to go on.

Darcy began but by the end of the second paragraph he stopped to peer at his wife who had a delicate, delighted smile on her face, a smile he could not understand when he had just pronounced the line ' _Marley was as dead as a doornail_.' So far he thought not much of the story but went on reading about this man Scrooge who was not upset in the least about his business partner dying, and he wondered why such an emphasis on the dying part as he read.

"He says something wonderful is to come?" said Darcy who paused his reading, "because Marley is _dead_?"

"Yes," replied Elizabeth.

"This seems a far-fetched sort of story and yet you and Mary say it is delightful?"

"Oh! Yes!" replied Elizabeth.

So he continued reading. The description of this Scrooge amazed him—the man was quite an ugly fellow, ugly in features, and ugly in manner, and Darcy wondered still that such a story could be delightful or cheering or _wonderful_.

He had not realized at one point that he had stopped as he contemplated the exchange between this Scrooge and his nephew but a voice called out to him, "keep reading."

"Yes, my dearest," he answered. He was especially awful, this Scrooge, to everyone, but especially the way he treated his clerk, Bob Cratchit.

"Can we not stop here?" asked Darcy.

"No," replied his wife who lay her hands on him, and he resumed his reading.

The ghost appeared and that was a more interesting affair than Darcy anticipated. He thought himself too old to be scared and yet the description of Marley making his way up from the cellar brought back memories of his own childhood and being alone in the nursery, alone and afraid.

"Are you well, Fitzwilliam?" asked Elizabeth.

"Perfectly," he answered falsely though without speaking of those long-forgotten memories of solitary days as a boy at Pemberley. He continued reading. Marley's Ghost described the ponderous and long chain that Scrooge himself had been laboring on and would carry when he died.

" ' _No rest, no peace. Incessant torture of remorse,'_ " he read aloud then commented. "I find it interesting that the man, or rather the ghost, is fettered and condemned to walk after death."

"An interesting thought, to be sure," replied Elizabeth.

"I wonder what Reverend Tupman would make of that?" said her husband.

"I am sure he would have strong ideas about it," she answered.

"And so Scrooge shall have to be like Marley, traveling around without rest?" He asked.

"It appears that is to be his fate," said Elizabeth, "but Marley is there with a purpose."

Marley scolded Scrooge when Scrooge called Jacob Marley a good man of business. _'Mankind was my business.'_ replied Marley… _'Charity, mercy, forbearance and benevolence were all my business.'_ He declared. Scrooge beseeched the Ghost to not be hard on him. Marley's Ghost replied he was there to warn Scrooge but also that Scrooge had a chance of escaping Marley's fate.

' _Thank'ee' declared Scrooge._

' _You will be haunted," resumed the Ghost.'_

Darcy stopped reading, chuckling. "I like the idea of Scrooge being haunted further," remarked Darcy.

"I think you are being naughty, Fitzwilliam, like a schoolboy, but we are almost done and both of us are tired. Keep reading," she said.

The specter of his former partner warned Scrooge again to expect three spirits to haunt him over three nights appearing when the clock tolls one. Then his supernatural visitor left him with one last lesson, a vision out the window at the air filled with phantoms all hovering over a wretched woman sitting upon a curb.

He ended the chapter by looking more closely at the illustration now that he had context to it—the odd one with the gathering of spirits hovering over a woman on a door-step.

"Do you like the story so far?" asked Elizabeth.

"It is certainly far different from what I imagined. What I cannot perceive is this wonderfulness Dickens eludes to and which you insist is to come."

"It is a merry tale, Fitzwilliam, extinguish the lights."

"Yes dear," he replied, and he did.

Mary and St. Michael were in for another surprise. New Year's Eve was a day of winds with the temperature dropping ten degrees or more—no one wished to venture outside on such a dull and blustery day. The visiting carriage and even the sounds of its approach were missed by that great crowd of people in the house. Jacob Bell had come to see his mother and step-father.

He was warmly welcomed all around and not a little confused and discomfited that both his brothers and so many Bingley cousins were residing at Pemberley as well. Jacob dutifully said greetings to his aunts and uncles, however, after kissing his mother and shaking hands with his father. He eyed his mother and Aunt Elizabeth and Aunt Jane and looked at the trio of Miss Bingleys who sat nearby, though the three youths were discussing something with their uncles across the room. His father gave him an encouraging smile.

"Miss Dennis has agreed to become my wife," Jacob said rather quickly.

"Jacob!" called out his mother.

"Congratulations," called out both his aunts in unison.

"Oh, Jacob! When shall we meet her?" Called out his cousin Minnie.

Question after question was put to the young man and he endured the process of having six women petition him about his choice of bride when he had imagined that there would only be two. He was rather tolerant, considering.

A celebratory dinner was ordered though a grand meal had been planned for New Year's Eve. There were the New Year's Eve activities too. The ritual of cleaning out the hearth in the great hall so that they might start anew awaited, a fresh log lay beside it, ready for the New Year. Come the stroke of midnight it would be burned for luck.

It had also been the practice to visit neighbors, back and forth, in years past and the best luck went to whoever had the tallest, dark-haired man cross their threshold at the stroke of midnight (4) which had made Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy—he of the renowned tall stature and handsome dark looks—a popular guest. But they visited less often as the gray crept into his hair but the Darcys still accepted visitors.

Daniel, who was not tall, but had dark Bennet coloring offered to wait outside and come in at the clock strike but was argued with by John and Joseph who were equally as dark-haired and taller. The three finally decided to share responsibilities for crossing the threshold and bringing luck to the family.

Darcy considered Pemberley had not seen such a happy New Year's Eve in ten years. They feasted and conversed, played at games, sang songs, and when midnight neared moved down to the great hall from the drawing room. The mammoth fireplace had the last piece of blackened wood removed, it was swept clean, and they watched as a giant log was laid in state waiting to be lit.

The male cousins went out into the cold to wait their signal and when midnight struck they came back inside making a great show of it with stomping boots, jostling to be the first over the threshold, their arms laden with baskets of coal, shortbread and a bottle of whiskey (which Daniel asked if he could share in) with laughter and calls to immediately light the new log to provide some warmth. There were drinks and more things to eat and Darcy swelled with pride at his extended family before him and enthusiastically kissed his wife when she strayed beneath the mistletoe. This made one niece giggle then all of them giggle at the sight of their elderly uncle and aunt kissing. Darcy only sighed and smiled with a sort of contentment at their youthful sentiments.

He had considered they would retire right after the boys made their good luck foray over the threshold of Pemberley Hall, but no one had wished to retire. There were more games and songs—the Miss Bingleys were talented performers and singers—and it was quite late before everyone was in bed.

It was too late to read and he said so to his lady wife who yawned and agreed.

Notes

3) A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens was first published on December 19, 1843. The first printing sold out by Christmas Eve.

4) There is a tradition of 'First Foot' that a guest bearing gifts (particularly symbolic gifts of black bun, shortbread, coal, salt or whiskey) would bring good fortune to the household. A tall, dark-haired man bearing such gifts was especially lucky; a blond man brought bad omens. This is part of the Hogmanay celebration that Queen Victoria introduced when she came to the throne—a Scottish tradition. I am adopting it here, bits of it, as each county often had their own little traditions and how can one tell how far across the Scottish border this tradition crept before Queen Victoria introduced it? It might already be in play in Derbyshire.

One interesting thought is how far back the idea of going OUT to party on New Year's Eve has been the tradition. It was almost as if it was unlucky to be at home, even two hundred years ago, on New Year's Eve—so there's a rather old excuse to be out and partying come Saturday eve.


	4. Stave 4: The 3rd Sign of Wonderful

**Stave 4: The Third Sign of Wonderful**

New Year's Day dawned cold and gray though the wind had died down so the young men all found sport outside with the Pemberley groomsmen more than willing to oblige. The young ladies had the attentions of their aunts and mother inside. Everyone found employment and enjoyment in whatever he or she set their hearts or mind to accomplish.

Darcy took up Elizabeth's book again that night.

"The First of the Three Spirits," he said. "I wonder if this one shall make the same sort of terrifying entrance."

"Wait and see," she replied, and he began to read aloud. The next ghost or spirit was quite different, odd and otherworldly but called 'The Ghost of Christmas Past.' It was a creature of white and light, lustrous and delicate. It proclaimed itself on a mission of reclamation and taking Scrooge by the hand led that hardened man on a journey of his past—to visit his past Christmases. 'Shadows,' is what the Ghost called them which Darcy thought a good name for memories of the distant past.

Darcy read on about Scrooge-as-boy, Scrooge-as-youth and Scrooge as a young man and all through the lenses of his past Christmases. All of them were rather bleak and miserable events with the exception of his time as an apprentice to Mr. Fezziwig. It was difficult to believe the ugly, hard man in the previous chapter had ever known or experienced joy but once, when he was younger, he had.

This surprised Darcy as he read of the Fezziwig party and its delights. He had considered Scrooge as always disagreeable, never changing, yet he had _not_ begun life as an old, disagreeable man. There had been heartbreak for Scrooge too—a young woman who broke off their engagement.

"I suppose I should have become just like Mr. Scrooge if you had broken off with me," said Darcy as he closed the book after he finished the chapter.

"I cannot believe you would have been so hard-bitten, Fitzwilliam," replied Elizabeth. "Your idol has never been a golden one."

"No," he reached for the extinguisher to turn out the candle light just as Scrooge had used the Ghost of Christmas Past's cap to attempt to extinguish its light. "My idol has ever been your beautiful eyes."

The sun joined their family party the next day, breaking through the gray mass above though only partially successful. Its appearance, however, meant no increase in warmth. All of the gentlemen and youth were delighted to ride out for the day joining the master of Pemberley in an extended tour of the estate. They missed the newest caller as what had begun with Sophy Thomas' visit seemed to be an inclination felt by all the nieces and nephews of Mr. and Mrs. Darcy as Captain Thomas Bingley and his next younger brother, Reverend Ernest Bingley, arrived together to the delight of their mother.

"You never said you were going to visit!" cried Mrs. Bingley as she embraced her sons who towered over her; they submitted happily to her ministrations.

"It was to be a surprise," said the captain, her tallest son by far. He seemed to have taken some height from his Uncle Darcy though no one, as yet, truly saw eye-to-eye with Uncle Darcy. Daniel still had a chance.

"I had to preach on Sunday, but Thomas came to collect me, and we left for Dovedale and arrived last night," said Ernest.

"But we were missing!" filled in his mother with good humor and sympathy.

"Only foul old Vincent with his dogs at his feet to welcome us," said Thomas, "but he did send us on."

"We had not planned to come but your rascal of a younger brother rode from home and once we arrived at Pemberley, others began to show up…" their mother began to tell the story of how everyone ended up visiting Pemberley.

Aunt Elizabeth ordered tea and refreshments and the two men sat with their mother and aunts—their sisters were hidden away with a pianoforte or with Mrs. Aronson—and heard all. No, there were no young ladies they admired nor could they stay but a day or two more since Ernest had to preach again on Sunday but they were happy to sit and indulge the ladies until the men returned from their ride.

The dining table needed extensions that evening and had not been so full since Collette still lived under the Pemberley roof and the Darcys entertained a great deal more with a young lady in the house. Some cousins had not seen others in two years or more, and the changes wrought by the younger ones, particularly Daniel, Joseph and Julia, were discussed by many. Julia's beautiful features were much admired that her mother feared she would become conceited. Her two oldest brothers took to teasing her lest she trade too much on her fair looks though Julia took the teasing in stride. Daniel and Joseph had both grown; Daniel changing from boy to youth. Joseph had joined his brother in becoming a man.

That crowding of cousins played and sang and talked late into the night but Darcy and Elizabeth were able to slip away and retired to continue their story.

"Are you ready?" he asked with some ceremony as he looked over at his wife.

"Perhaps not, what if I am too tired and should like to sleep?" she teased. Darcy realized he was eager now to discover what was to happen to Mr. Scrooge.

"I think I should read it to myself then," he replied.

"Well, perhaps you might read to me," she snuggled against him, her arms draped around his body as he began.

"The Second of the Three Spirits," he read. This ghost was so different from the last—a jolly man dressed in green, a giant of a man, who by description was probably taller and broader in the chest than Darcy, sitting on a cornucopia of food of the winter season made all into a sort of throne. This was the Ghost of Christmas Present.

This creature showed no bleak tidings, those rather dismal Christmases which Scrooge had experienced as a boy or a man, but all of the current cheerfulness ablaze in Great Britain despite differing circumstances.

People all around were in anticipation of feasting and celebrating, forgetting not the pealing of the church bells calling them also to worship. Scrooge had never seen such revelry, such faces of potential enjoyment at the idea of Christmas.

The tale of the Cratchit's feast moved Darcy like no other tale had. Elizabeth had said to him that he ate well and knew no depravation, never starved—he could claim the entire goose skin for his own as master of the house. And yet there were still those in his own household who considered the mince pies every day on the twelve days of Christmas a treat.

In this story, the Cratchits feasted on goose, apple sauce and mashed potatoes with great enjoyment—he considered the description of their Christmas dinner far more wonderful than his actual experience had been but days before with five times as many dishes. Had he been as grateful too for his pudding as the _'speckled cannon-ball'_ that was the Cratchit's own?

And then such a pronouncement about the fate of Tiny Tim from that jolly ghost; Darcy had liked the Ghost up to that point. _'I see a vacant seat…in the poor chimney corner, and a crutch without an owner…if these shadows remain unaltered by the Future, the child will die.'_

"Are you well?" asked Elizabeth," it is a sad pronouncement, is it not?"

"Such a sad event to contemplate, to lose such a sweet and thoughtful boy," said Darcy. He took in a number of breaths before he continued on.

The Ghost of Christmas Present showed Scrooge all the ways Christmas was celebrated by those with meagre fixings but that everyone was grateful for what they had and the company of those around them.

The chapter ended with Scrooge observing his nephew's Christmas party—one to which he had been invited but an invitation he had adamantly declined. There was merriment, amusement, flirtation and lots of games at Scrooge's nephew's house and though at one point Scrooge was the butt of a joke, still his nephew Fred defended him even drinking a toast to his uncle and his health.

"Am I such a figure to my nephews and nieces I wonder?" Asked Darcy. "That I am to be joked about, jested over in a game?"

"The proof is in the pudding as we learned when Mrs. Catchit brought out her handiwork for all to see and to taste," answered his wife.

"I do not follow you my dear," said Darcy as he laid the book open against his chest and looked down at her pressed against him.

"Your very excellent nephews and nieces come riding to Pemberley by whatever means they can to visit, dearest. I believe they might value you a modicum," the hand which lay against his waist pinched him playfully.

"Only a modicum?"

"Well," she took the book off of his chest and closed it, "perhaps more," and she handed him the book which he gingerly placed on the table and they settled to sleep.

Where before Darcy had young nephews visiting, those foolish boys who thought of nothing in leaping on a horse to ride twenty miles without ascertaining the weather or considering the consequences should it turn against him, or the two brothers who spent days cramped in a mail coach without break to sleep and barely time to eat, now Darcy had two grown nephews to visit and to converse with. The two grown Bingley sons appeared equally as interested in their Uncle Darcy's company as in their father's and the four of them plus St. Michael holed up the next morning—it was exceedingly cloudy and cold—in the study with that worn furniture, the excellent brandy and discussed issues that affected the two men: proposed changes in the army and a newer, evangelical outlook which pertained to the church. Both meant the men's professions were different, changing from what they had been thirty or forty years before for others in those positions. The pipes and the brandy and the discussions carried them well past the appointed time for luncheon and a footman had to be sent to fetch them to join the rest of the family.

During the meal, Darcy considered how much the table had expanded since Mary and St. Michael had first arrived on Christmas Eve, as his extended family had come to Pemberley, so unexpectedly but so delightfully, to visit. It was a noisy, bustling affair to have such a multitude of people at his table but it truly delighted him to look down the length of it and to see these people whom he loved.

He gazed at Elizabeth and considered her words from the night before and thought she was correct, he was loved, these people came to Pemberley; they came to visit him and his beautiful wife, because they loved their Uncle Darcy and Aunt Elizabeth.

"I should ask," he declared, looking down the table and capturing eyes as he glanced from one face to another, down one side and back up the other, "that all of you keep an eye out for other carriages bearing more family. This appears to be some sort of game or jest you have all played on me—to show up at Pemberley unexpectedly—and I believe I have not yet seen _all_ my nephews and nieces this Christmas season. So listen for the jangle of carriage harnesses or the pounding of fists at the door and be sure to tell me who has come next to Pemberley!" He smiled in good humor, feeling as though he was the Ghost of Christmas Present just then, that jolly giant with his ever-cheerful nature.

Many at the table laughed at this pronouncement and said they would be sure to tell him of any indication of more family. There was speculation as to who should come that day and would Vincent come, that gloomiest and most solitary of the Bingleys. Would he ride over to join them despite his disinclination in the past for such things, showing a desire to join in family parties?

By the end of the evening, however, no one had appeared at those massive front doors which lead into the great hall. The younger members had decided on holding games and plays in the great hall that evening as if they believed Uncle Darcy's pronouncement to be a premonition. The great hall, besides, presented the best place to stage a play which the triplets had insisted on presenting, bullying, despite their size and their gender, all the younger members into performing in. Servants had been cajoled into moving some additional seating there for the aunts and uncles, and the evening was the finest one yet since the beginning of the entire festivities.

"We have not quite finished our last chapter," said Darcy as they finally settled into bed that night. He felt so pleased, so joyful that he was quite identifying himself as the Ghost of Christmas Present and ensuring that Christmas was always merry, those around him happy and occupied, though it had not been Christmas Day, it had been an ordinary cold January day, though still part of the twelve days of Christmas, to be sure. "I am quite curious about the next ghost; shall he be even merrier than this last one? Shall Mr. Scrooge find his happiness in Christmas and be reformed?"

"You shall simply have to read and find out," said Elizabeth who settled on her pillow.

"I have been wrong to doubt your and Mary's choice of book," he said. He was turning the pages as he had not even marked where they had left off.

"Scrooge had been to his nephew's," reminded Elizabeth, "and then you spoke so poignantly about your own nephews and nieces coming to visit. I reminded you how many of them were under your own roof currently and how much they valued you. Consider how often Sophy comes, even now, to visit and how many times she came as a young girl. The weeks that she and Collette spent clambering through the house, in the gardens and in that dog cart in the woods. I believe that is why we enjoy her frequent visits. She loves Pemberley just as much as Dovedale."

He was thoughtful while he considered those memories, those shadows of summers past of his niece's and his daughter's antics, and the giggles and the joy and even the contentment that they had experienced at Pemberley over the past twenty-five years since they were old enough to have memory to recall.

"Ah," he said finally, "I have found our place," and he began to read about the Ghost of Christmas Present showing Scrooge all the people enjoying their Christmas celebrations far and wide, to see those in sick beds, in poverty, those struggling in jail even made more cheerful by a visit from this Ghost. None barred their door to him and he always left his blessing upon them.

The pair finally ended speaking with Scrooge feeling happy and giddy and then seeing the sharp side, which he had seen once before, of the Ghost of Christmas Present when Scrooge remarked about seeing something under his robes and the Ghost revealed two miserable children. Scrooge tried to find something decent to say about them but found he could not because they are so wretched, hideous and miserable-looking so he held his tongue. Darcy read as the Ghost explained that these were not the Ghost's children but they were mankind's children; he was simply a step-father to them like St. Michael was a step-father to Jacob. They were Ignorance and Want and just as there had been jesting in that parlor, Scrooge's nephew's parlor, Scrooge finds the Ghost of Christmas Present jesting with him, his words from earlier that day were turned against Scrooge him.

' _Are there no prisons? Are there no workhouses?'_

Scrooge's own words were thrown at him as the bell tolled and the Ghost vanished.

Scrooge turned and it was not a happy creature, not a welcoming redemptive ghost which Darcy was anticipating but a Phantom, a shrouded black figure, with no features, no true form besides that of a man standing before Scrooge and which Scrooge knew was the last spirit.

The description of the last of the three spirits brought shivers to Darcy. He had thought that Marley's ghost had been terrifying enough with his anticipated entrance but this sudden black shrouded figure and yet the sense that there were eyes behind that black shroud staring out at him, judging Scrooge, had rendered a shiver to run down Darcy's spine. Again he equated something to long and dark nights alone in the nursery when he was young. He paused to comment, "this is not what I was anticipating."

She patted him on the sleeve but said nothing else and he continued to read. That the figure did not speak added to its horror. Had it a voice, somehow, it would have humanized it, made it a creature, a person. Without a voice it was a form unlike the other Ghosts to which he could consider as once having populated the earth. But this thing seemed far more supernatural and other-worldly, a denizen, for sure, of the underground, of dark and dismal places. Those places that somehow creep into one's imagination on the long winter nights, despite lights, intelligence, and education attempting to hold them at bay. Men's fears still creep into primal places, consider dark forms, haunting creatures when the atmosphere is bleak and the light fails. There was something about a voiceless black form that Darcy found more terrifying than had it been a figure of death with his scythe but with a face and a mouth that spoke.

Scrooge was led around by this supernatural creature to hear pronouncements about a man who had died the night before.

First this man's business partners were heard from and they spoke with indifference and callousness to his passing. Scrooge questioned the Phantom about which among his associates had died and was being held up to him as an example but Scrooge received no answer.

He was taken to a rag picker's shop where the small people of the world, the char lady, the laundress, and the undertaker's man had stolen from this man without shame, even taking items off of his still-cooling body. Scrooge was so disgusted with these underlings that they would profit by stealing blankets, trinkets and the very bed hangings from this man's house. The ominous black creature showed him that very form—the dead body—lying covered with a sheet. But Scrooge had no stomach for revealing the identity of the man, and they moved on. Darcy shuddered but made no comment and kept to his reading.

It seemed there was no one who mourned this man and Scrooge cried out to the Phantom to show him someone who was concerned about his passing, and the Phantom showed him a family who cheered that they would not be sent to debtor's prison for non-payment of an over-due bill happy that this man was dead and could not collect the debt. This scene did not hearten Scrooge.

Darcy did pause then, "whoever he was, he was a truly disgusting and hated man," said Darcy. "That a man and his house are happier for his death."

"That is interesting, is it not," said his wife, "to consider such, but read on," she said it with a little sad twist in her voice, and he looked down at her, and wondered what was to come next.

' _Let me see some tenderness connected with a death, said Scrooge,'_ " and Darcy could understand such a request. The previous one to see someone with emotion about the man's death had been turned on its head so he went the other way, and then Scrooge found himself in a place he immediately wished he was not, for he was at the Cratchit's house. It was quiet, very quiet. The mother and all the children were seated around the fire and Scrooge heard softly spoken words and he realized the oldest son was reading and that the wife, Mrs. Cratchit, had been softly weeping. And in came his clerk, Bob Cratchit.

And every one of those Cratchits greeted Bob who tried to be cheerful and they fussed over him and told him, don't be grieved, but Scrooge watched as Bob broke down all at once. _'He couldn't help it. If he could have helped it he and his child would have been father apart, perhaps, than they were.'_

Darcy stopped reading at that point as he broke down in tears. "I thought this was a happy story, "he cried, "this was to be a cheerful one, not sad—redemptive—is not Scrooge to be redeemed?" he looked at Elizabeth. "I suppose the Ghost of Christmas Present said that Tiny Tim was to die, but somehow," he stopped to draw in a breath, held it, let it out, "I thought that was not to be," he said still with tears in his eyes. He set the book aside and gathered his wife tightly in his arms and they sat in silence but in tears for a few minutes. Perhaps they both recalled when they had lost that child, that son that was not to be. She had been a few months still from giving birth and that son would not have survived.

"I am sorry that I have ever wished for a son. I do not think I could have ever borne it, that I could have ever faced losing him later on. What if _you_ had died when that child was lost, Lizzy?' he cried laying his head down on top of hers.

"Do not think on _what ifs_ ," she said to him in return. "Think how happy you were, consider how spirited you were, just as we crawled in bed to continue our story, with all of your family about you and be thankful for _what is_."

There was silence again. They sat a little longer, simply in each other's arms.

"If I recall," he finally said. "Our author spoke of something wonderful occurring in that first chapter when he made such a blather about Marley being dead."

"Yes," replied Elizabeth, "and you made such a blather about this being such a poor choice of a tale to read. But we have not finished it, my dear. We will not judge it yet, until we have finished and come to the conclusion of the story, so read on."

And so, despite their shared tears, he took up the book which lay on his lap and he finished the reading for the evening. That Phantom, the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Be, led Scrooge past his offices which were occupied by someone else to a crowded graveyard and showed Scrooge a stone lying there with the name 'Ebenezer Scrooge' engraved upon it. Scrooge realized that all of those callous and indifferent remarks had been about _him_ , those people who profited by his death, had profited because he died.

It was then and there in that graveyard that Scrooge pleaded with the Phantom, that Ghost, to say that he was not the man who had been described by the three spirits, the man these people thought he was, the man that had been shown in these shadows and visions. The mere fact that Marley and the three Christmas Ghosts had appeared to him meant he was _not_ beyond hope and that he _could_ change, he _could_ keep Christmas, he _could_ move about the world with charity and good will. Scrooge pleaded with that dark and silent Ghost, pulling at his robes, that black shroud, and then Scrooge found himself clutching his own bedposts in his room and that was the end of the chapter.

"I am anxious to know what happens in the last stave. It says ' _The End of It,'_ that does not bode well," said Darcy.

"It is not cheering title," said Elizabeth who relaxed her grip on him a little.

"Shall we finish tonight?" he asked.

"It is rather later than usual, we got to bed late since our dearest Minnie, Edith and Julia were so insistent on putting on their little plays and their brothers and cousins were most indulgent," she said and tickled him a little. It made him smile as a natural response.

"I am not sure that John appreciated playing the king," said Darcy but he closed up the book.

"I believe they all had a joyous evening of it," said Elizabeth, "Mrs. Aronson and a few of the housemaids were most indulgent in finding costumes at the last minute for all of them."

"It has been more enjoyable this season than I predicted," he said, "having the young people around us—even Bingley's young men—and Thomas looks remarkably like your father," he said as he extinguished the candles and settled to sleep.

"He does," she agreed with a yawn.

"Can I change?" he asked suddenly.

"Change?" Elizabeth asked the darkness.

"Yes, am I like Scrooge and so set in my mind and actions, in the ways that I do things, in my entire outlook that I can no longer change?" he shifted to look at her though it was mostly shadows surrounding them, just a soft glow from the banked fire.

"We all can be like Scrooge. We can harden our hearts to others and give over caring or care only in such a way as Reverend Tupman cares or views," she replied. "Or we can change and examine ourselves and decide an area is wanting and that we need to change." She moved slightly in his arms but did not disentangle herself from his embrace. "Where do you feel you need to change?"

"I fear I have not been fair to Collette. I have wanted to keep her close, as though my favorite pet—she is my pet, my dearest—and yet as you pointed out she has been gone these many years." He paused as he conjured up an image of his daughter, the last time he saw her, she had a baby in arms and five little ones all in a flock about her.

"Charles speaks on equal footing with Thomas and Ernest," he continued, "and I fear I still treat Collette as a child despite the fact that she is the second born of all these cousins, only Sophy is older."

"Jane, Collette and Engleford's Jane, is eight already. We shall be speaking about her come-out ball all too soon just as we have been discussing Julia's ball," said the grandmother.

"Agnes will be the beauty, do you not think?" he remarked with some pride in his voice.

She squeezed him tight then, as if in agreement, and because something had shifted then as if she knew he meant those words about not having been fair to their daughter.

"And Frederick may only be five but I believe the dog cart Collette used would just fit him," Darcy speculated as new memories, potential happiness came to him.

"I believe it would," she replied, "though Pascal shall want to join in it too, he is only a year behind."

"He shall have a turn as well," said the grandfather as he considered his grandsons and how to entertain them during their next visit. "They will not be small and wiggly and loud forever. I have learned to enjoy the company of young men—my young nephews' visit has taught me much."

"And your nieces?"

"Perhaps there is a bit too much discussion of embroidery and fashion. They are not as spirited as Collette and Sophy were."

"Should we hold a dance?" Elizabeth asked. "Would you partner them?"

"Gladly," he replied. "I would dance with any of my nieces or my granddaughters."

"You are a wonderful man, Mr. Fitzwilliam Darcy," she replied.


	5. Stave 5: The End of It

**Stave 5 The End of It**

The two St. Michael brothers quarreled the next day at breakfast and Joseph, the younger by eleven months, went storming off. Mary worried though their father said that despite some showers that morning he would be fine and to leave him be; he would return. Brothers quarrel—Thomas and Ernest Bingley nodded and grinned—and Joseph at seventeen, was best off left alone.

He did not appear for luncheon but St. Michael sanctioned no search party and assured Mary he was simply in the stables with the grooms, or in the steward's office discussing farm accounts, or down in the kitchens seeking delicious treats.

Joseph appeared suddenly while various members were gathered in Aunt Elizabeth's green parlor mid-afternoon, dramatically throwing open the door.

"A carriage is coming and the horses are post!" he crowed.

Such a statement sent many feet scrambling out of the room for Elizabeth's favorite room did not look down the drive but out the back of the house, out and over the gardens (though there was nothing to currently view out those garden windows since a shower now obscured much of that view).

"I do not recognize the crest," reported Captain Bingley to his mother when he came back to sit with her. "I wonder if it is some old friend of uncle's come to visit? He has, no doubt, been on his way and decided to stop in to see Uncle Darcy," he explained away the mysterious carriage and crest.

"Who travels at this time of year and in such weather?" called his brother who was a practical-minded man.

"Are you sure it is simply not one of our neighbors come to call?" Asked Elizabeth.

"The horses were definitely post," assured Captain Bingley.

The triplets, the St. Michael brothers, Jacob, and Daniel all returned with news that it was a lady and a gentleman come to call but they could not tell _who_ since it was raining despite spying down on them as they had exited their carriage.

The _who_ surprised everyone since Uncle Darcy had said the day before to expect more cousins to appear. Everyone had expected more _Bennet_ cousins but the visitor was a _Darcy_ cousin and, in a way, not related to anyone in the room save Uncle Darcy and Aunt Elizabeth. Georgiana Darcy's daughter, Maria Mason, had come to call.

Like Jacob Bell, she wore a startled expression on her face when confronted with a roomful of people given she had only been expecting two, her uncle and aunt. To be surrounded by such an assortment of grinning and watchful people made her shy and withdrawn.

Maria Mason was a copy of her mother, about one and twenty, and Darcy moved forward eagerly to welcome her with such wonderful memories crowding his mind of his sister, Georgiana, that he wanted to immediately share them with Maria.

"My dearest Maria, welcome!" he cried, kissing her on the cheek. "I have been thinking of you and wishing to know how you fared. It is such a pleasure, an honor, to see you." Should she have wished to speak he was not allowing her an opportunity. Elizabeth came to stand beside Darcy and reached both hands out to her niece, and kissed her on both cheeks.

"You are most welcome dear," said Elizabeth, and then turned to look at the young man who stood quietly next to Maria.

"May I present my husband, Mr. Thursby," said Maria who withdrew one hand to place it on the arm of her spouse in a sweet and protective gesture.

"Welcome to the family Mr. Thursby!" cried Elizabeth who let go of Maria's hand to clasp Mr. Thursby's and shake it. Darcy succeeded his wife in shaking Mr. Thursby's hand then the newly married couple found themselves kissed and embraced by that crowding of other-side cousins and aunts, and their hands shook by the not-truly uncles who welcomed them, nevertheless, to the family.

Where before there had been a magnificent dinner to celebrate Jacob Bell's engagement an unending feast was required to celebrate Maria and Mr. Thursby's wedding. They were invited to stay as long as they wished.

The couple had married on New Year's Eve, and were on their wedding tour but Maria declared she had planned to stop at Pemberley to seek out her uncle and ask for his blessing. It was obvious, as she spoke, how important this was to her. At dinner, she sat next to her Uncle Darcy blushing prettily but speaking earnestly at that now vastly populated table of that fact—that though her wedding had been a small affair his blessing was of great importance to her—to send her off on her new life.

Darcy stood and asked everyone to charge his or her glass.

"To my most beloved and beautiful niece, Maria. You have my and your Aunt Elizabeth's blessing on your marriage. We congratulate you, Mr. Thursby, on stealing such a prize. May you be blessed with health and happiness and live a long life together surrounded by children, family and friends." Darcy raised his glass high looking with immense pride at that crowd of family before him.

Everyone seconded the toast and cheered, then others added their own blessings to the couple. The feast and celebrations went on long into the night. The Thursbys were embraced by all the cousins as if they were their own.

Darcy thought for sure they would not have time to return to their story that evening. As with so many previous nights because of that crowding of relatives (though such festivities he welcomed) some activity kept them up past their usual time of retiring and, as he often jested though it was an earnest jest, he was getting on in years and his old bones needed their repose.

Elizabeth was, for once, the second to retire but she came into the room armed with that candelabrum, with both candles lit and an eager smile on her face. He blinked a little as he watched her place the light beside him, hand him the book and then walked all the way around the foot of the bed to crawl in at the other side.

"Read," she commanded.

"I assumed it was far too late," he replied.

"You were so…melancholy yesterday, Fitzwilliam. I wish you to see the wonderful," she replied.

"I am not sure that I trust our author, this Dickens," he said with a sigh. "He has spooked me, delighted me, made me see my own faults, but the number of emotions and memories I have experienced within the context of reading this small little ghost of a story has been many. I am not sure that I can handle any more; that my heart can handle any others," he said looking at her and holding a hand to his chest.

Elizabeth snuggled closer to him as was her want. "That was quite a pronouncement. I believe we may say Mr. Dickens' wonderful has already occurred if the proud and distant Fitzwilliam Darcy of Pemberley has so much to say about his feelings."

"Are you to ever give over teasing me about our first meeting my dear?" he sighed.

She kissed him on the cheek, "Not when it does you a little good," and she kissed him a second time. "But I think we should finish up our story. The last stave is shorter than the others."

"My dear," he kissed her in reply, settled back on his pillow and opened the book. " _Yes!_ " Darcy roared with a loud voice for that was the opening word of the last chapter.

Scrooge was aflutter, scrambling about and glowing, knowing that the time he now had was his own to make amends in. He could determine his future and that future (which the Ghost of Christmas Yet To Be had detailed with such grim particulars and points) was _not_ to be his fate. He praised Heaven and the Christmas time and declared: _'I will live in the Past, the Present and the Future!'_

Scrooge's hands were busy with his garments, taking them off and on, turning them inside out and trying them on upside down.

"How can that be?" asked Darcy who stopped to consider what a garment, worn upside down would look like.

"Perhaps Dickens is having a little fun with us?" laughed Elizabeth. "Authors are often flowery with their language when describing events."

' _I am as light as a feather, I am as happy as an angel, I am as merry as a schoolboy. I am as giddy as a drunken man.'_ Declared Scrooge as he frisked about his house until he was winded and had to settle down. He stopped to laugh and discovered he still could; Scrooge discovered that he had a splendid laugh despite being out of practice for so many years.

"How is my laugh?" asked Darcy. He chuckled mildly. Elizabeth reached over to tickle him and them it grew in volume and depth until it rang out merrily.

"Splendid as well," she answered.

Scrooge reckoned himself a baby just then so different did he feel, so full of new sensations and new discoveries. He ran to the window and opened it to a cold morning yet with golden sunlight pouring in, a heavenly sky overhead, and to the sound of church bells, and discovered it is yet Christmas Day. His spirit guides had managed to do all their visits in one night.

"It seemed as though it should be three nights," said Darcy as he stopped to consider what Marley's Ghost had said about the visits.

"That is part of the wonderful," replied Elizabeth.

"But did not Marley say each was to come at the stroke of one on each successive night?" frowned Darcy.

"Wonderful, miraculous, glorious, heavenly," said Elizabeth, "keep reading."

Scrooge was inspired to send a turkey (one which was twice the size of Tiny Tim) to the Cratchit House. His charity and humor included sending that prize turkey off in a cab since it was so large that the delivery boy could not possibly carry it the entire way to Camden Town which make Darcy chuckle right along with Scrooge at that point in the story.

"I can see him attempting to shave and laugh at the same time," said Darcy at the next bit. "And just _how_ difficult that is. But that he _dance_ d!" and Darcy laughed heartily at such an image.

"I am sure your valet would have much to say about that if you should attempt such," said Elizabeth.

"No doubt," he laughed long before he could take up the book again.

Scrooge walked out onto the streets of London to see all the people pouring forth also into the streets and to greet them with a delighted and glorious smile and on his lips "a merry Christmas."

"A delighted smile?" Darcy set the book down again to look at his wife who patted him and raised her eyebrows in amusement.

"Yes?" she asked.

"I would not have ever thought of Mr. Ebenezer Scrooge as wearing a 'delighted smile' as he walked the streets greeting anyone."

"You wished for redemption and now you are arguing against it?" She said.

"No, no," he placated, "it is simply that I cannot imagine it, my dear," he kissed her suddenly and passionately then. "I rather like that phrase 'a merry Christmas,' shall we begin to use it?"

"It does sound pleasant, does it not? Merry Christmas! (4)" She kissed him in reply, settled back onto her pillow and then admonished, "keep reading for it is late."

Scrooge was beside himself on the streets, _'he looked so irresistibly pleasant,'_ as he watched people around him hurrying to their destinations, he patted children on the head, questioned beggars—everything he did and saw and experienced and felt gave him so much pleasure. _'He had never dreamed that any walk…could give him so much happiness.'_

He went to spend Christmas with his nephew, asking shyly ' _Will you let me in, Fred?'_ and had his arm almost shook off in response. Scrooge was at home in five minutes, everyone welcomed him, his niece-by-marriage, his nephew and all their guests, with games and wonderful happiness at that party.

The next day he had attempted to be gruff and return to his former brooding ways to play a joke when his clerk Bob Cratchit appeared eighteen minutes late for work, but found he could not hold out more than a minute or two. Rather than yelling at his clerk, he declared to Bob Cratchit that he was about to raise his salary! Scrooge then sent his clerk out to purchase more coal for his fire and said that they would drink together that afternoon and discuss all of Cratchit's affairs, but especially his family, for Scrooge wished to help with the raising of Cratchit's family.

" ' _Scrooge was better than his word. He did it all, and infinitely more; and to Tiny Tim, who did NOT die, he was a second father,' "_ Darcy read and then turned to Elizabeth. "I am pleased you have bullied me along to keep reading. I should never have stuck with the story otherwise. And I am pleased that our Mr. Dickens let us know the fate of Tiny Tim."

"I am pleased too since you shed so many tears over the boy," she ran her hand over his chest. "I wanted you to see the wonderful. We all can be reclaimed if we are shown that the path we currently tred has become darkened and overgrown and it not the one for us to use anymore and we need to seek out a new one, a well-lighted path."

His wife and his sister had been correct; it had been the most wonderful of stories. After that grim fourth stave, despite Scrooge's assurances that he had been reformed and seen the error of his ways, the rather gloomy chapter title _'The End of It'_ had not assured Darcy. But he found himself tickled inside, warmed with such a heartening conclusion, with feelings that he perhaps could not even name but certainly ones that made him want to kiss his wife and greet all of the family gathered around him at breakfast the next morning with a cheerfulness he had not used in probably twenty years.

It was lively and noisy and yet companionable that morning, and all Darcy could think about was how blessed he was as he sat between Edith Bingley and John St. Michael; he listened to them talk about what was important to them but he listened intently, focusing on hearing what they had to say. Edith thought being the middle daughter meant being lost in such a sea of children, and John felt like he was ready to tackle the world and did not see the point of continuing to go to school. Uncle Darcy listened without comment which was, perhaps, what they both needed just then. They did not seek advice but sympathy and he well able to supply that.

Darcy knew he wanted to do this every year. The circumstances would not be the same. Daniel would be a year older, hopefully a miniscule wiser and not running away from home. Darcy did not think he could convince all his nephews and nieces to appear for the entire twelve days of Christmas.

But he thought about that little book that Mary had bought on a whim and had brought with her to Pemberley and shared with his wife—she who had poked and prodded him to read it. He thought he might be able to convince everyone to come for one day; perhaps for Christmas Day. To come celebrate with him. He would see more babies born; he could see everyone as they grew, watch as their interests changed, be able to meet Jacob Bell's Miss Dennis, be able to hear about the day that Captain Bingley figured out what else to do (since he was unhappy with the army), hear about the day John St. Michael, perhaps, figured out that his father knew more than John the younger allowed him credit (and that maybe school was a good idea), and celebrate the days when Julia, Edith and Minnie had engagements to announce.

Not everyone was at the breakfast table but Darcy was the master of Pemberley, he could make pronouncements whenever he choose, so he stood with a glass and called everyone to attention, once again, just as he had made a toast to Maria and Mr. Thursby the night before. He called,

"To my dearest family," he looked around the table, "I suggest that this has been such a wonderful time, such a wonderful season, that we make it official. I invite everyone to come back here, to return to Pemberley next year by Christmas Eve to spend Christmas Day in celebration here, and I promise all of you the merriest of times. There will be presents waiting, fires roaring in every grate, there will be good things to eat, there will be plays, and we shall dance and we shall sing and we shall talk and visit and laugh, drink and feast the days and nights away."

There was a roar of approval from everyone at the table who proclaimed it a most excellent idea. If the season be merry, why not make it doubly so with the addition of games and fun and with the extended family gathering again under the Pemberley eaves and repeating this experience the next year and all the following years! Even Jacob with his new bride-to-be, and Maria and her new husband, agreed to travel from their homes and to return to Pemberley. Maria even agreed to induce her brother to consider coming the next year and Thomas and Ernest Bingley stated they would not let Vincent continue in his solitary and reticent ways lest he turn into a curmudgeon and insist he come too. Darcy could not but hope and pray that they were successful lest his oldest nephew turn into the likes of Ebenezer Scrooge.

Everyone was at the luncheon meal when Daniel called above the dim of the noise at the now rather long dining table, "I hear a carriage!" Some voices quieted down but others still continued talking and did not heed the words of the youngest among them. The dining parlor was on the ground floor but at the back of the house so there were no windows to spy out of and ascertain if there truly was a carriage crawling up the drive.

Vernon came in unexpectedly and without his usual stiff expression on his face. He even appeared to be moving more quickly than was usual for him.

"Sir," he said softly and breathlessly to his master, "the Engleford carriage approaches the house!" His old face cracked a small smile then before he nodded to Darcy.

"Elizabeth!" called Darcy as joy crowded his chest and danced around inside of him. "Collette and Engleford have come!"

All of the cousins and aunts and uncles put down their utensils, pushed back their chairs and moved at their desired pace from the room through the passage and into the great hall where one of the footmen had the door open to spy on the carriage's approach. The younger cousins chose not to wait but poured out into the day, a day of some sun, not breezy though still cool, without coats or hats or shawls or gloves to swarm around the carriage as it pulled up at the bottom of the steps in front of Pemberley Hall.

The Loddington groomsman jumped down to let down the steps and then the Engleford family was welcome and embraced by their young cousins, all a-chatter as they kissed and hugged and talked all at once, and escorted Collette, her husband and all of the children who scampered and laughed at such a greeting up the steps and into the great hall where the older generation waited.

"Mamma!" cried Collette, "Aunt Jane, Aunt Mary!" and she hugged and kissed them and then turned to her father.

"My dearest," said Darcy who embraced and kissed his beloved daughter who stood tall and beautiful before him with her youngest son in her arms. She had her height from him and her beauty from her mother, and Darcy thought he might weep at such a treat as an unexpected visit from Collette and her family. "You and Engleford and the little ones are most welcome."

"I have grown ever so much, grandfather!" cried Jane, his granddaughter at his side and tugging at his coat.

"So have I," said Agnes, and the two of them hugged him around the waist.

His two oldest grandsons tackled him somewhere around the legs in an affectionate gesture of sorts, and then they ran off to follow the older male cousins.

Collette handed him her baby, his fourth grandson, to admire. Darcy had just settled the child in his arms, amazed how quickly he remembered how to hold a baby and how amazingly comfortable it was to snuggle the bundle when he felt something on his leg.

"Put down," scolded Robert who was barely beyond being a baby himself.

The grandfather handed the baby back to his mother. Darcy knelt his frame down so he was closer to the infant's size, though even kneeling he still towered over the child.

"How have you been?" asked Darcy.

"Bad," answered Robert.

"Shouldn't you ought to be good?" asked his grandfather.

"No," he answered and shook his head emphatically.

His mother piped up, "bad boys need to go stand in the corner," she pointed to the farthest corner of the great hall. The two year old considered that for a moment.

"I be good," he looked over at his mother with a resigned sigh.

"I think that is a grand idea," said his grandfather. Robert ran off to join in whatever everyone else was doing which largely meant interfering. His siblings complained of his presence but all of the cousins welcomed him with the same heartiness they had welcomed everyone else who had walked through the front doors of Pemberley Hall.

No one went to bed anywhere near their usual time of retiring. It was, after all, Twelfth Night, and had not Engleford, Collette and all the children come, there was still reason to celebrate. Now there were so many reasons no one had to pick or name one, everyone simply joined in. The Twelfth Cake was eaten and so parts were picked for a play because Mrs. Goodluck had baked in a bean for the king and a pea for the queen, a clove for the villain, a twig for the fool and a rag for the maiden.

John and Joseph also convinced the cook to bake a false pie crust and captured a handful of live birds which were hidden away under that crust. When poor Aunt Jane went to cut into her mince pie and the little birds flew out she let out quite a scream. The four little birds made a home in the great hall for almost two days before all of them could be convinced to fly out to freedom through the front doors. Most everyone thought it was a good joke, though Charles Bingley took exception at playing a joke on his lovely wife.

There was far too much punch to drink (Mrs. Goodluck had produced enough wassail to make everyone in the house quite tipsy) and no one could prevent Daniel from imbibing too much and he took ill and was the first to retire. They sang songs after the play had been performed. There were some neighbors who came to visit, singing and drinking—joining in and welcomed heartily in their revelry—which added to the pleasantries of the night. Though Darcy had once thought he needed to fear there would be too many young men who were out imbibing wassail or other liquors, and singing to the trees, as was the custom for the night, most of them proved wiser than he thought, and they sang only one or two songs to an apple or a fruit tree before coming in out of the cold.

Darcy and Elizabeth did not have time to sit and talk with their daughter until the following afternoon. The older cousins took all the younger cousins in-hand for some game, and Collette found her mother and father alone in the green parlor, devoid now of its greenery since it was bad luck to have evergreens still hanging after Twelfth Night.

"Mamma, Papa," said Collette with a shy smile which was quite like her father's, "I am to have another baby."

"My heart," said her father.

"Pardon?" frowned Collette as it was not the response she had expected.

"My heart overflows at the idea of more grandchildren to spoil," he recovered.

"I am pleased for you sweetheart," said Elizabeth with a bright smile. "You have truly been blessed."

"Engleford is over the moon," said Collette. "Though we have decided to make some changes."

"Yes?" prompted Elizabeth.

"It is too much to be moving the children back and forth to London when he needs to be there. It was almost too much when Robert was born but it was certainly too difficult when Walter came along." The two grandparents sat patiently. "I shall remain at Loddington, but perhaps you might come visit?" She looked shyly at her parents, all her own and yet uncle and aunt to so many. "Or we might all come stay at Pemberley? I should love to have the children come to know Pemberley more than they do. I had always envisioned I would spend more time here but the years just fly by!"

In the Christmases to come there would be dancing, and Darcy would dance with whichever niece or granddaughter wished it. Queen Victoria and her husband were pictured one year sitting by a cut evergreen tree inside the palace and so Pemberley adopted the custom of cutting a live tree and decorating it with ribbons and baubles for the Christmas season. There had been New Year's and Epiphany songs to sing, and one or two Christmas carols but the popularity of new Christmas ones grew in the coming years (and they had a family of talented musicians and singers) and took to caroling their neighbors each St. Stephen's Day.

Darcy did everything he could to ensure that all the grandchildren would wish to come every Christmas because Pemberley would be the most festive place to celebrate the season. Games and food and presents, gaiety, caroling, and plays, sleigh rides, hay rides or simply riding in the delapidated dog cart. The Christmas dinner was to be everything anyone could imagine (and he would share the goose skin), and the desserts more than anyone had bargained for.

He no longer worried who, in some distant future, would come home to roost at Pemberley for he was perfectly content with the assortment of family who came to roost at Pemberley every Christmas.

Notes

(4) Many credit the common use of the phrase 'Merry Christmas' with Dickens and this book. While linguists argue that it was in use before the publication, the wide-spread use of it at Christmastime took a huge leap in the 1840s after the publication of A Christmas Carol.

A/N: Written because I went to the Dickens Faire and it occurred to me there were some similarities, the _reticence_ for sure, between Darcy and Scrooge. And I adore A Christmas Carol ; it and 101 Dalmatians (the book not the movie) are my two favorite Christmas novels.

Apologies for not posting first thing this morning. Mom getting pneumonia threw my schedule off.


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